Morrow Days Tale
by Fan Fiction Enjoyer
Summary: Basically rewriting Monday and Tuesday. The story will ENTIRELY be the same save some little details being changed and such. And the English won't be as bad as it was. 25/02/10
1. Monday's Fall part1

Mondays Fall

Part I

An autumn breeze swept across the Secondary Realm the Architect had chosen for that final gathering. The world of choice was a place devoid of anything except vast and luxuriant fields of grass and lawn hidden by countless flowers of every color man can imagine. There, Her faithful servants the Morrow Days would gather. Out of Nothing She had wrought the Incomparable Gardens first, but the "Eternal Fields", as that particular world was called, came second. They were not special as such, She had merely decorated the place as she saw fit as Time went by, and for the last few centuries that world had been an haven of tranquility and flowery flagrance. The Architect liked to come here and ponder on whatever occupied Her mind at the required moment. Now, the Days were to gather in this place. Not even in the Gardens, no they were summoned in their Mistress' very private place. That had to be a very special occasion, so every Morrow Day selected their best clothes for the occasion.

They were all radiant with beauty and elegance. Even Thursday, who was a soldier who didn't particularly like ceremonious occasions, was outfitted with the ornate high ranking officer getup he despised so much. They talked a little among each other, but only for a very brief moment as the Architect rose and approached them. They all stood in line, Sunday being the closest naturally. But instead, She went straight to Monday, and without any explanation, with a loud and clear voice, she bellowed:

"Into the trust of my good Monday, I place the administration of the Lower House, until such a time as the Heir or the Heir's representative call upon Monday to relinquish any such offices, properties, rights and appurtenances as Monday holds in trust. "

Astonished and voiceless, Monday merely accepted the First Key and the Architect moved on to Tuesday, repeating the same lines as She did to the former, changing only a few words as to fit what would be given in trust to him. She finished with Sunday, granting him guard of the Incomparable Gardens until the Heir came to reclaim them. No one could see it, but there was something odd about Saturday as she was given the Sixth Key and trust over the Upper House. Why would they bother about who was entrusted with what? Surely enough the Heir would manifest himself or herself pretty quickly…

Or would they? What if they disobeyed?

That was out of the question. The Architect had left a Will, behind. A piece of heavy parchment, they could feel its power in the very air they breathed. And yet… they had the Seven Keys in their hands… They could destroy it…

The Morrow Days agreed. They pointed their Keys in the Will's direction and in chorus they chanted:

"From Nothing to Nothing!"

What followed was a chaos of light and destruction that words cannot describe. A good area, about a few miles in radius, of the Eternal Fields had been destroyed in a heartbeat and yet the Will was far from destroyed. It was shattered, but it was still there. Apparently, they could not outmatch the Architect's power with Her own tools, and what inherent powers they had were hardly equal to a single Key, let alone Seven that just failed badly at a task… It was decided that they would hide a part of the Will, specifically the part with the clauses concerning themselves. The moment they left to do that, their Tales began…

***

Monday liked the shape his Key had. The sword was a symbol of strength, nobility and only those with great vitality and energy ever wore swords. For a time, these qualities fit him perfectly. When he returned to the Lower House wielding the First Key, he merely had us all to resume business as usual. He would see to any business that required his newfound authority, which means quite a good deal of businesses. But of course it would not last. As much as he wanted, Monday's Tale was not meant to be one that ends well. Like any other story, it begins on a relatively good way, but unlike others, it doesn't end that way.

The Rightful Heir has his story. This Tale, is about the Trustee named Mister Monday. It's his Fall into Darkness. Behold this true Tale, brought by you by Monday's Noon, formerly Monday's Dusk. Behold Monday's Fall.

***

"I would recommend you do not do that, brother. The Original Law states…"

-"States what? Our Master authorized this little survey, Dusk. Do you not trust our Master?" replied Noon, his tone full of exasperation. "I'd like to remind you the Architect is gone and She left the wheel to the Morrow Days, one of which being our good Monday, our Master. What could happen? Anyway if you do anything stupid, like file a report to the Court of Days, Monday's going to take the blow along with me and YOU. You're as much under his service as I am. Are you looking for trouble, Dusk? Oh and weren't you coming, one way or another?"

I sighed.

"No, Noon, I am not looking for trouble, and it's because I want to PREVENT trouble from happening that I'm coming with you." I replied, as calmly as I always did. "I suppose a simple "survey" doesn't do any harm but you always manage to intervene with mortals, and you know our presence doesn't do them much good in the first place."

-"Our presence? Not good? Pfff. Their superstitious ways keep us from severely traumatizing any of them. Remember that old woman who thought I was an angel?"

-"I distinctly remember you jumping at a petty thief out of some feeling of self-righteous justice. Not to mention…"

-"You're no fun at all, Dusk!" angrily replied Noon. "Look, you're my little brother even if I'm older by what, a fraction of a second? It still pretty much means I'm the wiser one. And know this, Dusk. All work no play makes you a boring boy. You don't want to be a boring boy, don't you Dusk? Besides, as I said, I'll be only sightseeing."

I sighed again and massaged my temples while my brother kept making adjustments to the Seven Dials. These seven grandfather clocks, if they were all adjusted correctly, could allow you to see a good deal of places and even visit them. Noon had grown increasingly keen into visiting the Secondary Realms and not just their present, as set by House Time, but also their past and interference in the past usually lead to numerous paradoxes in Creation. These errors in Time were compensated for via the input of otherworldly phenomenon as to never break the continuity of Time; such was the superiority of the Architect's work. But the effects on population were rather unpredictable and destructive at times, and these "compensations" occurred on all levels of visitations, may it be in the past or the present, may it be by moving a pebble or killing a king...

"I do not think whether I am boring or not is relevant to this argument, Noon." I finally replied. "Besides, if you're only sightseeing as you say, you may just adjust the Dials consequently, no need to visit then."

-"Dusk," finally said Noon, with finality. "You're the one who insisted into coming with me, even outside your allotted time. Mister Monday was kind enough to authorize it and I don't know why and how, but he got the Upper House to keep its eyes shut for the duration of the exploration, not to mention the Court of Days.

But hey, if you like to spoil presents, go ahead and stay behind."

With that, he stepped in the circle made with the Seven Dials and into the shining, white mist inside and disappeared into it.

"Red-headed reckless idiot…" I muttered before I followed suit…

***

When the thick, glowing white mist of the passage through the dials suddenly receded, a forest full of dark and tall coniferous trees appeared right in front of us. That place didn't ring any bell to me and Noon either didn't seem to know where we were. He confirmed this by saying:

"Talk about a boring place. Where are we anyway?"

-"Somewhere absolutely not fascinating, let's turn back now." I replied, annoyed already.

-"Yeah right, Dusk, we have about twelve hours leave left; we might as well put them to good use. I suppose you'll want to walk to explore a bit. Pity, because I'll be flying. Catch you later!"

All in a rush, Noon's wings burst from his back and he was sky-high in a matter of seconds. I grunted of exasperation and was about to draw my own wings when I noticed my brother had dropped a scroll in his haste. I picked it up and read it. Apparently, it was Noon's and I authorization to wander in the Realms as we saw fit. Most paragraphs involved me and my Right of Visit, as I had a sight less prerogatives than my sibling. Monday used Noon and Dawn much more than me, and as such I was relatively free of any responsibilities, but that meant I also had a good deal less powers than one or the other, alone. That pretty much meant a lot more paperwork was involved whenever I needed Mister Monday's authorization to go out of my line of duty.

I sighed, folded the scroll and tucked it into my sleeve. Then I summoned my night-black wings and flew high up in the blink of an eye, hellbent on catching up with Noon before he stuffed his nose where he should not. After a few hundred miles of flight and what seemed like an eternity of forest, I finally caught sight of a town of some sort. Judging by the peculiar architecture, Noon and I had landed somewhere on Earth, more specifically in Asia. Probably Japan or China or other. Things changed so quickly in the Secondary Realms, there had never been but little point into studying them and their cultures too extensively.

I figured Noon was down there. If he wasn't, I was ready to give up the chase; he could be anywhere, else.

Apparently, I wasn't mistaken. The people's appearance, their clothing and language was definitely Asian. I couldn't tell what era it was, though, assuming we'd landed into the past. I definitely hoped it was NOT the past...

I glanced around a little, looking for my red-headed brother and surely enough he was standing by a stall on which were laid some sort of merchandise. I came closer and saw it was actually tea.

"Heh... I suppose I might as well buy some myself too... This will probably all count as one and the same paradox..." I thought, and took a step forward, just next to my brother, some gold coins in hand.

"Thought you didn't want to intervene, Dusk." said Noon, acting overly surprised.

-"Thought I'd let you have all the imported tea?" I replied.

-"You're not so boring, after all. That's good!"

We kept visiting the town for a few hours. Indeed, that visit proved to be quite worthwhile. It may be so that human culture changes about every century, but there was so many things about their culture and their art that were worth seeing in the flesh, so to speak. So much creativity, and yet, their lifespan was very limited. Could it be possible that the source of their creativity was their mortality? With so little time, did humans feel _driven_ to accomplish as much as they could, even though Time would invariably ravage their work? The very impermanence of their artifacts was always the very reason why I would usually accompany Noon in his peregrinations into the Secondary Realms, paradox or not. How could we afford for so much Time to be merely Recorded and not witnessed for real? And yet... by visiting, we were destroying it all...

My thoughts were suddenly interrupted as an unlikely scene unfolded right in front of us. Four men, soldiers apparently, were standing in circle around what seemed to be a simple peasant and were taking turns at beating him with branch of some sorts. I frowned and prepared to walk away, but Noon clenched his teeth and took a step forward.

"Noon..." I warned. But of course he wouldn't listen and he took another step toward the soldiers.

"Noon, we cannot interfere so drastically. Back down."

-"You would allow this, brother?"

Usually, when we Denizens visit a Secondary Realm, we have to bring proper gear as to be as innocuous as possible. Superior Denizens, like Noon and me, do not need to do so because our power and authority magically cloaks us. But at that moment, probably owing to Noon's loss of focus, it wasn't working at all and whatever illusion had been woven around him failed. The soldiers probably saw him change and that draw their attention.

Unfortunately, Noon saw that too and decided to use it to his advantage even though he was already a thousand times stronger than these humans. His white wings burst from his back and stretched them far and wide for impression's sake. Then he flexed his fingers and summoned his longsword into his hand. The blade was of steel and the hilt of gold, but the weapon was entirely coated into Architectural fire.

To these poor soldiers, Noon probably looked something like an avenging angel. And then he slew them, shielding himself from the bloodshed with his wings.

I was utterly shocked. Four dead in the Secondary Realms in an unknown era. That was not bad, that was much worse than that. When I finally came back to my senses, I rummaged in my coat's pockets, looking for my watch. I drew it and looked at is many numerals and hands, looking the one indicating what Time it was here, relatively to the House.

Meanwhile, the mortal Noon had saved was staring sheepishly at us.

Unfortunately we were in the past. That meant pretty bad paradoxes and if that man was allowed to live, it would only make things worst. I put my watch back in its pocket and drew a black glove in its stead. It was a Nightmare glove. It was pretty nasty but I thought it'd leave a little less traces than chopping the man's head off.

I merely grazed the peasant's face and he dropped dead, slain on the spot by his worst nightmares. It was Noon's turn to be shocked and when he looked at me, accusation in his eyes, the only thing his gaze met were my own cold and equally accusative eyes.

"We leave. Now."

We returned to the House by Transfer. To that end, we merely had to tear up our Authorization scroll. We were back into Monday's Dayroom in one of the many reading salon. My brother and I hadn't moved at all and we were still staring at each other.

"You knew I would have to do this, Noon. To say you acted foolishly would barely even describe it."

-"Don't you even dare judge me. You understand so little of our place in the House, let alone what it means to our place in the Secondary Realms. Such a waste."

How had we come to this?

I watched as my sibling then walked away calmly, coolly, trying to look as if he was unaffected by my lecture but he knew too well I was right. Or did he? Or... did _I_ know how wrong I was about _him_. And everything else.


	2. Monday's Fall part2

Monday's Fall

Part II

My Master didn't wake up immediately. It took a few minutes before he opened his eyes.

"How long have I been asleep?" he said.

"Oh, you dozed for five minutes, sir." the Denizen in front of Monday replied. "You said you were a little tired and needed a little rest, so you did."

"Oh well." Said Monday, who was clearly embarrassed. "Well I suppose I will sign that paper of yours? What was it already?"

"We were discussing about an order for Activated Ink from the Far Reaches, sir." The functionary answered.

"Well then, let us sign them!" happily said my Master as he signed the paper.

"Forgive me Master," I finally said. "We have come to report, I and Noon."

"Yes yes! So, hum, it seems you are back earlier then expected…" replied the Trustee. "Why's that?"

Clad in his red silk Kung-Fu robe, covered with blue dragons, with blond hairs, Monday was impossibly awesome, as every Trustees were, due to their station. The only humanoids to have such beautiful human bodies and clothes in the Universe were the Morrow Days, as the Trustees agreed to call themselves. The Architect, who was gone a few centuries ago, was the only one who would be more "good-looking" for human eye.

"Because Monday's Noon interfered once more with mortals," I finally replied. "I expect that it wont go unpunished… you know more then most that it is contrary to the Original Law, master."

Noon was silent. He obviously knew I would not be able to make him punished… I could have done so with my sister, Monday's Dawn, if she did something bad, but Noon was Monday's favourite servant. Probably because he was stubborn, that he always had his own mind. Perhaps that was virtues Monday admired.

"Well, one mortal less on the Secondary Realms is not much, Dusk." said Monday, who seemed to be already knowing about the "accident". "If he had destroyed a wordlet or a complete Realm, I would of course react more but, you are right. He interfered. I suppose I could…"

"Take these bags of tea, Master." Noon said, cutting off the Trustee of the Architect. "I admit I did a mistake and I will assume every consequence that must follow my acts."

"Tea bags, is that loots from the Secondary Realms? Or you actually bought that from the Far Reaches, Noon?" asked Monday with curiosity.

"Am I right to think you said you were tired earlier, Master? I heard tea was really refreshing. You should give it a try." Finally said Noon, using is manipulations technique. Everyone around him was a puppet for him to use… and he was good at it.

"You take too much care of me, Noon. You both can go; I won't punish you for your interferences, both of you. Now, everyone out! Monday said, waving his hand, inviting us to leave.

As soon we got pass the huge doorway, the doors slammed shut behind us, closing with a loud: "Bang!"

We walked toward the exit of the Dayroom. Not that we weren't allowed to be here, but we had our own things to do. We got separate as we took our own elevators. We waved our hands, in salutation, and entered our respective elevators. Mine was less luxuriant than Noon's one, but I didn't cared. It was an elevator after all, not my room. There was a simple long chair in the middle of the big room, a piano near the elevator door. The cellar had a check board pattern; there were also big windows with black curtains, giving a sight into space and night. There were paintings of me and Monday too, everywhere in the room, huge pictures at least fifteen feet high. I pressed the single floor button inside the elevator. Nothing was written on it, but as soon my finger pushed it, the word: Monday's Dusk Office appeared. And the elevator began its travel down, a few hundred floors down. Not much, it would be five minutes maximum.

I wondered suddenly why Monday slept in his office. Of course we could sleep if we needed to regain energy more quickly, because even if we were immortal, we had physical forms to maintain so we "existed" and it needed energy, but his Key was meant to do that for him. In fact, Monday "did not" need to sleep… that's why he was able to work twenty-four hours on twenty-four, all along the week. Even I only had to sleep only one time every two centuries, only the normal Denizens needed to sleep every twelve hours.

When I arrived at my office, which looked like greatly like my elevator, I was being welcomed by one of my Midnight Visitor. He bowed when I passed and followed me.

"You are in time, sir." He simply said. "There are many things we need to do. As usual, you will have to sign the permission for us to go out and clean the presence of nocturne Nithlings before eighteen o'clock, and also, it would be appreciated that we arrange the troubles that were done at noon, in Earth. Since its after-noon there, it will be us who shall deal with the wash between the ears of any character witness there."

I knew what it meant. We had to brain wash every mortal who had seen Noon killing that thief with his Architectural Sword. I never liked to do that, but I had to, since I knew Tuesday's Dawn would not take care of that matter. I heard there was mining operation that needed every Denizen in the Grand Cavern, including Tuesday's Dawn, Noon and Dusk. So I couldn't count on the Far Reaches officials to deal with Noon's stupidity in the Realms.

"May I inquire why sir Monday's Noon returned a mortal to Nothing, sir?" asked my servant. Noticing I was lost in y thoughts, he asked his question once more.

"No I think not, go back to work. Bring me that paper I must sign and send Fetchers take care of the mortals matters… wait no." I just had forgotten Fetchers were carrying a virus that mortals could catch. "Prepare a squad of Midnight Visitors, a lot of them, since the whole crowd ran away when it saw the sword of my brother."

"It will be done as you desire. However must I remind you, sir, which we do not have as much Midnight Visitors your brothers have Comissionaires?" calmly said my subaltern.

"Yes, yes I know." I replied. "Gather as much possible…"

"Yes sir. As you order sir." The Midnight Visitor replied as he left. Every midnight visitors had black tail coats and they had a red ribbon on their top hat, though the one who spoke to me did not have his Nightmare-whip and Night-gloves with him.

Then the question he asked me suddenly had a weird effect on me. Why did my brother spill blood, was it linked to Monday's sudden weariness? Even if it was small enough to only need he to sleep five minutes? Noon always had a compassion for mortals, that they are honest or dishonest, he always liked them. I never thought before he might "kill" a human, he preferred them most then any other mortals! Monday broke is promise toward the Architect, that's big but he kept the work as it was before She leaves. Noon broke is promise toward the Original Law, fair enough also, he never really interfered seriously. Both of these things were not too grave… But now Noon completely ignored the Original Law, Monday was weakening a little in his faithful service to keep the work done correctly, would it go worse, like it happened with my brother? I went out to talk about that with my sister, Monday's Dawn. When my elevator opened on her room, I saw robes. Not the pink robes she usually wore, but different ones, each with a style different of the other. I saw that her bathroom door was closed, her normal clothes on the floor. Then she went out, wearing one of these outfits. She was wearing an emerald green robe, making her even more handsome then usual.

"Oh Dusk!" she said, with her clear voice. "I thought you would have knocked, but no matter you know, hum, what can I do for you? Is it business? It's no longer dawn in the realms so I got nothing to do, but I might help if you need assistance."

"Oh, none of that." I replied. "Hum, did you buy something from the Far Reaches?"

When no reply came, I knew what happened. I left her in her room, staring at me, as if she was still thinking of what she would answer me. When she finally said "yes" without too much conviction, I understood that it was loots from the Secondary Realms.

Monday fell first, then Noon, then my sister, who, I thought, was wiser then me and Noon. But she also fell. She also fell into disobedience to the Architect's rule. She lightly broke the Original Law, as Noon first did. What if she kept breaking it, doing bigger and bigger interferences with mortal, ending up killing them, like Noon did today? Then I wondered, was I next? Or was I being paranoid? After all, maybe my Master was right. A few less mortals in the realms, it wasn't that big. I finally convinced myself Monday's Noon and my Master were right. It's nothing too bad after all… we didn't destroy a Realm. All these disobediences to the rules set by the Architect weren't serious. We were opposing them, yes, but not completely. We fixed the things we did wrong after all. It wasn't huge. Yes that day, I convinced myself nothing we did was wrong… even if I knew it was.

Author's note: I am thankful for the only review I had, however, reviews being only an auxiliary objective, I shall not be frustrated for the lack of them, since I am aware "The Keys to the Kingdom" is not a very popular serie... yet. For the grammar errors, I am a little powerless because english is not my first language, but I shall do my best and I would be twice thankful if you could enlight me with your wisdome about english grammar.


	3. Monday's Fall part3

Monday's Fall

Part III

Two thousand years ago, Monday's Noon had killed a mortal, slicing his throat open with an Architectural Sword. Two thousand years, Monday's Dawn had started to oppose the Original Law. Two thousand years ago, Mister Monday, as he calls himself now, began his reign of sloth, just a little at the start, but it grew bigger after. Hear the third and last part of my tale of Monday's Fall into sins.

Journeys to the Realm with my brother Noon became frequent. He killed more and more mortals, as if to prove he was superior. In fact, he was. Even to me, though we are meant to be equal. If we had to fight, we would probably end up both on our knee taking our breath so much we would be tired, each of us in the incapacity to move, but he had an advantage on me. This advantage is not concerned on the strength of our sword, it is in our mind. Noon always have been a leader, he wanted something, and he had it. He had, and still have, a gift with manipulation. I never doubted Mister Monday, as he called himself until he was vanished, would name him Steward, but his sloth prevented him from doing so, hopefully.

The last time I saw Noon fly, his wings were stained with blood from mortals. Each time he slashed with his sword, blood would fountain everywhere. He used his wings to prevent the red liquid to touch him or his clothes. My wings too had blood on them, though it was an hard task to detect where the blood landed since my wings were black. Only Noon, who saw it happen, could tell where there was blood, and where there wasn't.

My sister also began to interfere with the mortals. A little at the start, then a lot after, the first time she went to Earth, she gathered a collection of kingly robes. Then she went to get a myriad of umbrella. The more she was going to Earth, the more her room was filled with props a human lady would have. Then she began to flirt with men, only to test her skills to seduce them. In time, she became the legendary beautiful queen of Egypt, known as Cleopatra… The legendary woman with her past shrouded in mystery… Quite normal since Dawn didn't stay there eternally.

And who had to fix all these interferences so it would seem to be normal for mortal? Me. I, Monday's Dusk, cloaked the time of Dawn in Egypt with all sort of procedures and by modifying a myriad of records. In time, no trace of Dawn's time in Egypt remained on Earth. I also disguised Noon's long list of murders by creating loads of serial killers. No traces of his deadly time on Earth remained. All was clear because of who, me. But there was one person of my entourage from who I could not fix the mistakes, Mister Monday. Three hundred years after Noon's first murder, my former Master started to sleep one hour a day. It was comprehensible, with all the hard work he had to do. But in time, his weariness grew, making him impatient during his work, slightly impatient at first, but as the centuries passed, he was not resting, but still growing wearier. In his impatience, he ordered that we call him Mister Monday, now. Now as in, two thousand years after his first hint of weariness. And it's where I am in my tale, two thousand years after the first day we saw Mister Monday sleep. Now he always does. Twelve hours a day in fact. This is what I cannot fix. The Master of the Lower House would not kill me if I bothered him while he rested, but he could ask Noon to do, and loyal to the Master as he was, my brother would have obeyed. I remember in, that millennia, going at my sister's room to talk with her. I went into personal elevator, unchanged since the start of the actual fashion, in fact, right after the Breaking of the Will. Once I reached her door, I knocked on the door. I knew Dawn hated to be surprised so I did, in order to begin the conversation calmly, so it would remain calm. No need to start what would seem to be hostilities for someone who is tetchy like my sister was at that time. I knocked thrice, and entered. Dawn was reading a book, but closed it as soon I entered. It was Monday's dawn in the realms and she was not at work… she _was _not at work… It wasn't like my sister to be late at work, but I was not here for that.

"Dawn, we need to talk." I simply said. She looked at me for a while and finally said:

"Are you here to tell me once more how hard it is to cover my acts in the Realms once more, brother?" she did not sound like it but I knew it was a complain. They thought I was to keen about preserving the Original Law, and unfortunately, I broke it myself, but only to fix the stupidities my siblings did in the Realms! And to sight-see also… nothing else in fact, nothing grave. "Must I remind you that you broke the Law with Noon long before me?"

"I know what I did and if you kept your activities in the Realm as you did two thousand years ago, Dawn, I would not be angry after you and Noon." I replied angrily, but with my always calm tone. "But what you did in Egypt was a little too much. I had to let the poor Wednesday's Dawn fix the things I could not for me because I had to take care of your case, sister, and you know she is three time busier then we can be all together!"

"How's that, _poor_ Wednesday's Dawn? Is it not meant to be Tuesday after Monday anyway?" replied Dawn, not trying to conceal her disappointment. "Beside, what does she have to do with that? Is it not Tuesday's Dawn who is meant to take care of what you can't take care of?"

"Actually, Tuesday's Dawn has been split into seven since Grim Tuesday dug his Pit deeper." I replied, now really showing how angry I was. "Beside, there was Nithlings outside that I could not clean out because I had to take care of you and Noon! And Wednesday's Dawn kindly accepted to do that for me since I was busy taking care of the cloaking your petty interferences outside!"

"Fine! If you want, Dusk!" she was shouting now. "Now are you happy now? I will stop going into the Realms just for you!"

"I did not say that! Just try to be stealthier. I said, regaining my calm. "Beside, I came to ask you if you didn't notice change with Mister Monday."

"Why's that?" she asked, trying to calm herself down. "Did you see something I did not?"

"Well every Morrow Days seems to have problems lately… Look Grim Tuesday. Except his name change, he begins to dig really deep into the Foundations of the House. And I had words Lady Wednesday has been transformed into a giant white whale by her hunger. And Monday who is getting wearier day…"

"hum. I did notice for the other Days, brother. About our Master, I did not notice anything. Beside, Monday always has been the most energetic Day on all the…"

"False. He is now sleeping half the day…" I replied, exasperated by the blindness of my sister. "And he is getting impatient all more and more. Apart of him, you noticed at least that Noon was killing lots of Denizens, did you?"

"Well. You know, he only killed that thief…"

"No Dawn… he killed more then hundred mortals. You never noticed the dried blood on his wings?"

"Hum… no… in fact I thought it was wings-"

"Wings paint, sister? No it wasn't the paint number 037002. Anyway, it seems that our master is not only stroke by weariness, but more by sloth…"

"How dare you say that, Dusk, huh? She was not angry, but more surprised by what I said.

"Dawn! How you could not noticed it! One day I followed Noon into the Realms… therefore breaking the Law but it's not the point... and we saw him making a jogging in a forest instead of working! Another time, when I was in Egypt fixing your activities there, he was on a long chair, taking a sun bath!"

"There are many techniques to rest except being in a bed, Dusk. she said.

"I don't want to sound harsh, but I think that sloth is spreading through Mister Monday's subalterns." She blinked at the word sloth. "Look at you. You were reading a book here instead of working at you office, Dawn."

"If you hadn't come here to talk to me, I _would_ be at work, Dusk!

"Indeed. But when I arrived, you should have been long gone…" I said sadly. "Even Noon is no longer at his secretary office near Mister Monday's office. Denizens who must arrange a meeting with him are lining up! There are actually a few thousand Denizens waiting in the Antechamber, right next Noon's secretary office."

"I believe he found a substitute." She said firmly.

"Yes but he isn't meant to do that. He is supposed to always be there except when its noon outside, when he is meant to fix things of the Secondary Realms."

"He thought about putting a ticker machine, brother."

"Another trace of sloth. I don't want to be harsh, Dawn, but Monday's actual lack of vigor is touching both of you and Noon.

"How dare you? I'm not late in my work, Dusk! Or only a little, it's not my fault if I know what is fun, unlike you, Dusk!" she angrily said to me.

"Dawn, every departments under me are doing fine! Look, the Efficiencer General is missing and he his under both of you and Dawn since you agreed to ally your departments in order to lighten the work."

"If you joined us, the work would have been done." She said with self satisfaction.

"I don't want to make me looks like superior, but it would have been because I would have been there… listen, sister. We are going nowhere; I let you think about it."

And with that, I left her. I called my elevator, pressed the floor button but before the door closed, I exited the elevator and let it go to my room. I hided next the door of Dawn's room, I waited for two hours. She never got out going to her office. Dawn was past an hour ago when my sister got out. When she did, I said her that:

"See what I said? Now really think about it, do not read another book."

And I really called my elevator after that, really leaving her that time. In my elevator, I pressed the button and the line of text inside it formed the name of the place I was going to. My office, even if I had a lot of time before I had to go work. My sister, the one I always thought was wiser then I and Noon, this time was giving me her place as the wise one. Even the Master was blind. I realized Mister Monday always ignored me a little, but now I was completely standing under his shadow. Then I realized that because he ignored me, the sloth curse he cast involuntarily on his servants did not touched me. I realized that already being in shadow, that one did not affected me. When you stand in the dark, you are always more sensible to the light. You see it when it grow or when it dims. If you are right on it, it takes a while to realize when it changes. And when my sister and brother would realize that they were no longer doing the things right, it would be too late to go back. I was the only one to still see the right path, and I could not make things change alone. I needed help to show the light to those I always loved. Help would not come from inside the House… it was for sure. I knew what I had to do, but I could not proceed without preparations. I will have my time and once it will come, I shall save my siblings from shadow. And save myself… in time.

And so end my tale of Monday's Fall…

And so end the prelude to Monday's tale.

Now let us venture to my next tale which is the second part of Monday's tale. I called it:

"No efforts are in vain."

Author's note: No time to fix grammar stuff from now, we would say I choosed a bad moment to put that story online but I struggle to update. Beside, I had problems Saturday to login so I was in impossibility to update... sorry for the verb tenses, I do my best you know, I lead aninvestigation andIfoundsome of theerrors. I'll fix them whenI'll be more free.


	4. No efforts are in vain Part1

No efforts are in vain

Part I

I could have given up hope. I could have let everything as it was. Monday would be sleeping and entertaining himself forever, letting lots of Realms fall with him. My brother and sisters would then see their mistakes, but too late… Like when you stand a lot of time in the sun, when you begin to be in shadow, it takes time before your sight is back perfectly. I could have told myself: "Let it be, it would be easier to give up and leave the Morrow Day Mister Monday destroy himself." But I could not. I considered my Master like an uncle. If he had kept the good work, I would be glad for him to keep the Key, and I even would come to believe the Will was wrong to force Monday to relinquish the Lower House, how could a mortal beats that excellent work Monday did right after coming into possession of the First Key? No mortal would have been able to do better… but now, even a slug would be more active then the actual Master of the Lower House.

After a while, I devised a plan. I pushed hardly the door of the meeting room of my council of administration. The seven Denizens were seconding me for the administration of the dusk while it was Monday outside. The door banged when it smacked the wall.

"Ok, friends!"

At first, my servants were surprised by the vocabulary I used, but I had no time for oral protocol or grammar.

"We will free ourselves from the administration of the dawn and noon!" I proudly said.

The small crowd began to chatter, in agreement.

"But first, we need to buy contracts from Denizens fromall over the Housein order to strengthen our military force!"

The chatter suddenly stopped. The council clearly thought we would not stand a chance against the Bespoke Sentinels. Huge human shaped metal creatures, no corporeal details, their body polished perfectly, blades instead of hands and nearly invincible. Doubtless a Dawn, Noon or Dusk would hardly triumph over one of them, but only a Day would defeat all twelve.

"I am sorry, sir, "said one member of the council. "But I think it is an bad idea to attempt a war effort, if my ideas of your plan are true, I think it is not wise to get Mister Monday's wrath on us…"

"My Master won't bother about that. The Rightful Heir shall be selected when we will get the Part One of the Will back." I finally revealed my plan. We were to gather legions in order to slay the Bespoke Sentinels.

"But sir! A council member answered. "You are aware that the Sentinels are the work of Grim Tuesday, their thick metal skin is probably to be wounded by one of you majestic sword you and your sibblings hold, sir, and even more bya Key, but it is not everyone who has the power to wield such wonderful weapons, or even the rights."

"Light-swords or axes shall do enough, if we can gather the army I ask, gentlemen." I merely answered. "I know we will have to surprise the enemy so it can be slain easily. I also know that we need to prepare everything carefully so my brother or sister won't notice anything, but I know we can do it! There are many Denizens in the Far Reaches who will gladly join us in our campaign instead of digging and mine the Grim's Pit!

Everyone kept silence. Now every parts of the House knew about the Far Reaches' industrial activities. It was no secret since Grim Tuesday developed avarice as my Master had sloth progressing through him. Rumours were that Lady Wednesday was being prey to gluttony, though it is unknown if it was her choice, like for Grim Tuesday and a little like Mister Monday, but facts are that she was turned into a whale.

"Sir, you are not without knowing that every Denizens sent to the Pit have huge debts they owe to the Reaches' authority only because they breath the foul air that reigns there?" said one of my servant. "And they owe even more for their very presence there. Even if we bought Denizens right before they have debts, they would be hard to train as soldiers. "

"Not even considering they will not be soldiers!" replied another Denizen. "It will take millennia before they even learn to use a silver sword!"

Then everyone spoke to contest or to make a critic about my plan.

"Silence! I shouted. Having a lot of authority over them, they could only do what I asked them, though I did not wish to force them into my campaign, but convince them… unlike my brother. "We could command Comissionaires but, you are aware that such an order would not be unnoticed and my brother. AndMonday's Noon, has the authority upon such units in the Lower House. If he was to learn our plans, he could turn them up against us. Denizens that will be loyal to us are preferable."

For a while, the council thought about my proposition. The Denizens forming it were functionary, not warriors. Even those we would "buy" off the Grim were something else then enforcers of the law. They were also untrained to be miners, which was basically an easier job then soldier. In brief, we would have to train them from scratch. They had no fighting experience; a human would be able to slay them, even alone.

"Who will risks themselves against the Bespoke Sentinels?" Boldly asked my second in command.

"We shall see." I replied. "For now, order Nightmare Whips and Night Gloves from the Reaches. Pay the lowest price possible."

"We could take some cash from the Dawn Department, since they named us Account Trustees of their bank account" One of my servants proposed.

"We could… but I do not whish to make Monday's Dawn suspect what I'm doing. While Inspectors can't do military harms to our operations, they can warn Noon who will be able to round us up."

Every member nodded in agreement. I considered my campaign was adopted. We would first arm any Denizens we could engage into our operations, Hall or Corridors Cleaners for example, though some would still be required, but too many were cleaning. It was so neat I wondered where dust was going away. We had to gather money also so we had to triple our services. We could take care of the Monday's dawn and noon even more so our commissions would increase our benefits, and my brother and sister, in their sloth, would only be glad to take more time in the Realms. Mister Monday would notice nothing and since I had taken control of the Lower House, in a certain way; I could take a commission from him. I had direct access to all banking accounts since all three Monday's departments were under me now (the Dusk Department was doing the tasks of the Noon and Dawn one); I even had a small access to the Day management. In brief, my operations would go unnoticed. My only concern was if my brothers called upon me to relinquish the administration of their accounts, doing so, my source of money was cut short. Nothing bad could happen. If I could also buy a few crafters from the Reaches, forging of weapons could be done here and I would only have to pay for the Nothing, which I could also take from the Deep Coal Cellar. If I could find a few allies, my plan would go as I wished. First, gather all financial means in order to form an army capable of taking down the Bespoke Sentinels. Second, prepare that army for a war against twelve super powerful foes. Third, finding some allies all around the House, I supposed I could gather help from the Border Sea since I could offer services to them because they appeared to have troubles with their administration, like here in fact.

I omitted one single fact: All those things would happen if I kept control of the Lower House. The Rightful Heir would probably assume the same role Mister Monday kept for a few hundred years after gaining possession of the First Key. I could not give the promisedhelp to my allies at the aftermath… the only hope I had was to make the Rightful Heir name me Steward of the Lower House. After all, the Heir would owe me that, with all my faithful services.

Then I realized I was not scheming the releasing of my domain from Monday's sloth, but my ascension to power. What if the fallen Trustee's curse had no influence on me, but that my brother's gift of manipulation had? Was it my brother who was polluting my mind with such schemes? Was I jealous of the fact Monday was preferring Noon to me? Was it _envy _driving me forward to topple my Master? What if my efforts were in vain and that I would still be Monday's Dusk and nothing more? At first, I wanted to free my siblings, but was it to be superior to them? Was one of the other Morrow Days' curse upon me, instead of my Master's one? Was I becoming power thirsty, instead of slothful? Then I said to myself: "The Architect would be proud that you want to do something about Her will. Fear not, all you do is well and rewards from the Heir will only be bonuses." I did plotted against Monday but he first got against the Will of our Creator, so whatever I did against him was in Her name, so it was good. Anyway I was sure he would be glad about waking him up. Though the idea to raise an army to topple the Morrow Day so the Rightful Heir would reign over what is his or her was a weird one, it was what had to be done. Things had to change, no matter what. Sloth would be hunted down, and I would be rewarded, my brother and sister would be safe, as my Master would also be. That's all I wanted. The doubts I had were only caused by my lack of confidence, but I knew my efforts would not be in vain… not totally at least.


	5. No efforts are in vain Part2

No efforts are in vain

Part II

It was five thousand years after the Breaking of the Will. My plan was on the work since a few millennia. The army was ready, yet not fully trained. We had used huge financial means in order to come to the final phase of our plan. Weapons were ready and all troops knew how to use them correctly, yet they were not masters of them like the originals Midnight Visitors. I had appointed a few lieutenants in my small army of three thousand Denizens, that I hided in a desert Secondary Realm. I doubted we could actually defeat the Sentinels with that few troops so I decided my plan had to change. First of all, we would not destroy the guardians of the Part One of the Will. We would distract them so I would use the minimum amount of powers I had under the imprisonment strictures, in order to weaken them so the captive could break them at last. Then we would be gone. I wished we could engage my first plan but we were in the impossibility to buy records from somewhere else then the Far Reaches because the Grim's greed blinded him, other Days would have seen clearly through our schemes. As for Wednesday's Dawn, she could only provide a few materials like refined Nothing that had no use so we could craft a certain amount of weapons ourselves instead of buying them. That saved a small sum of money indeed. She also was able to acquire, though I don't know how, the location of the Sentinel's outpost. It was a dead sun lost somewhere in the world… All I knew is that it's recorded had been altered so its location was "inexistent". I had the name; the only thing that was to be done now was to fix the place of the attack.

Record Keepers were under the Noon Department, so I had to head for these offices. As I entered my elevator and pressed the only button inside, I began to think of how we would strike. First thing to know, we had to surprise the foe. Sneaking was not an option since the protectors of the magical prison were posted in a circular pattern around it. I knew that the Sentinels only had to cut slightly a Denizen, even me, to kill it. Their blades were infused with some death energies that needed no fatal wounds to slay. Their skin was made from Immaterial Steel, so only I could deal a serious wound because of my Frozen Moonlight Blade, and even then, that would be no easy tasks. I probably would have to strike a few times at the same spot of my foes' body to deal a cut. When I finally arrived at the "Stars Record Archive", I got out of my elevator, a Deputy Clerk of Stars welcomed me and asked what I wanted.

"Greetings, state your name, number, rank and business please." I politely asked.

"I am Pravuil, 392759 in precedence, Tenth Assistant Deputy Clerk of Stars, sir." The Denizen replied.

"That's perfect. You are the one I needed." I said. "I need you to amend the record of the sun named Flowerbloom."

"I am sorry sir, but modifying a record, may it be of any lesser being going to higher ones and passing to inanimate objects is strictly forbidden by the Original Law." Pravuil answered.

"I see… that is sad for the Law however I have my reasons and you may not know them… yet. For your own interest, I would do what I say if I were you."

"Which is not the case, sir."

I frowned. How did he dare challenge me? I was nearly at the top of the Lower House's administration! He didn't know what I could do, that was for sure.

"Do you know who I am, Tenth Assistant Deputy Clerk?"

"Of Stars." Corrected the bold Denizen.

"Yes… Of Stars."

"You are Monday's Dusk sir. Third in Command in the Lower House, as said by Master Mister Monday, I am bound to sir Monday's Noon, so you got no authorities on me, and I say I shall not amend that record for you since it is contrary to the Law. Besides, you are lucky I do not report you from inciting me to do so."

"You think my brother would actually care if I disobeyed the Original Law?" I hissed. I was nearly Steward of the Lower House and that petty pathetic record-flipper dared to challenge my authority! "I will tell you something, you clearly do not know what I could do to you if I wanted to… as for my authority over you, watch this…"

I clicked my fingers and the foolish Denizen suddenly straightened before me. He now realized how stupid it was to oppose my will. I ordered him to lead me to the record of the sun Flowerbloom, and unable to resist, he did. He clenched his teeth, still trying to resist my undeniable authority over him, but his arm lunged in the shelve containing the record I searched. I then ordered him to give it to me. I said: "Don't move and I may spare you and not send you into the Grim's Pit." I knew the Denizen named Pravuil would have replied, only, I did not order him to do so. He was still under my direct command. The record wrote itself when I looked at it. It was in the form of a book, not a parchment that time. The text was:

"_The Flowerbloom sun is a sun in an unknown Secondary Realm that…" _Blah blah blah…_ "It's light shone on the phew planets in the..." _all futilities here… _"Was discovered by "$!¢£¤£ when he crashed his spaceship in the.."_ the fool… he was able to crash there. _"When the sun died, it's location was"_

And it ended there. This was what I wanted. Only Inspectors knew the real location but if I altered the record to show the sun was elsewhere, it would also be. Where there was a blank space about the location, I wrote: Eternal Fields. Then I said:

"I free you from my spell. However, I demote you from your name and function. You are now a Coal Collator and you now work in the Deep Coal Cellar."

"What? But it is you who broke the Original…"

"You want me to sell you to Grim Tuesday? No? Then behave. Good bye."

The only mistake I did in all my campaign was to underestimate a bold Denizen… he did not leave his job peacefully, as he left a letter on his desk. A letter that would cause the total failure of my marvellous plan…

My troops were already in the Eternal Fields. The Flowerbloom sun, which was "the dead star" where the Part One of the Will was trapped, moved somewhere into this Realm, as its record showed. As I met my lieutenants, we all agreed we had to do fast before the Sentinels notice something. We were about to order the army to deploy their wings and fly toward our strike zone but it never happened…

My naturals Denizen reflexes allowed me to parry a quick blow that was aimed toward my neck. The move was well done, good technique, good precision, if I wasn't a Denizen, I would have been hit for sure. My opponent's blade nearly pierced its prey, and I felt the heat of the weapon. It was an Architectural Sword…

As soon I realized that, Commissionaires charged my army, my troops were unprepared from that assault and a lot of my shoddy Midnight Visitors were quickly arrested by the fully programmed mechanized enforcers of the law. I drew my own weapon when a horizontal sword slash missed me as I back flipped. I met Noon's angry eyes and ordered my troops to defend themselves. Soon, I heard the sonic booms of nightmare-whips and the clashing of the Commissionaire's Sergeants blades. Noon's own troopers were less numbered then mine, actually, but more trained. That was about to be a tight fight. I and my brother were exchanging blows to abnormal speed for mortals, but it was only a training speed for us two. We were testing ourselves before unleashing our full power on each other. Rainbow sparks flew in every direction as our blades crossed. Each cuts and slashes would have been strong enough to pierce through the Sentinel's skin and the clanging of the opposing swords were being heard all around the Eternal Fields, now converted into a war ground. The struggle between me and Noon was not the fiercest though; my Midnight Visitors wrapped their whips around their foes weapon and disarmed them, easily rendering forcing them to give up after, but the Commissionaires, for their part used well disciplined positions that provided excellent defence possibilities and offensive moves.

The world of eternal beauty was full of violence. I and my brother were fighting in the sky, our wings wide open on our backs and on the ground, and Midnight Visitors used their particular fighting style while Commissionaires used discipline. When I flew a little lower to escape a flurry of blows from Monday's Noon, I could smell that particular scent of oil and sweat, the vision that was offered to me was the one of a true war. Many of my troops were on the ground; their hands bound with indestructible chains, some Commissionaires were broken or shattered. The black trooper of mine used their whips to remove the limbs of their preys by wrapping their weapons around them and pulling hardly, and the bulky blue troopers of my brother, though their fighting style was mechanical and easily predictable, were still able to put their blades on my servants neck, forcing them to obey. There was no end in that battle… I parried, blocked and dodged my brother assaults and he never let me any opportunities to strike, on the other hand, he was getting tired and I was still full of energy. When my turn came, I aimed for his wrist, not his head, as he did for me. My strikes were accurate, fast and fluid. I did not use raw strength, but speed and efficacy. My thoughts about a draw about a swordfight between me and Noon were confirming, however, it did not last. When I finally gained the upper hand in this fight, as did my army, someone came and interfered.

I was finally about to disarm my brother by hitting his sword's hilt really hard when another blade blocked mine. A blade, not of fire, but light, I gave a look to the Sun Light Sword wielder and saw my sister. She quickly overpowered my because of my weariness. When she finally disarmed me and put her blade against my neck, my troops knew it was the end. Though there was only a few Commissionaires Sergeants remaining and a little more mechanic soldiers, they could not oppose Dawn, by any mean. They bitterly dropped their Nightmare-Whips and threw their night-gloves on the ground. My sister did not spoke, she handed me a letter instead. It was written:

"_To: Monday's Noon or Monday's Dawn_

_From: Former-Pravuil 392759 in precedence, Tenth Assistant Deputy Clerk of Stars_

_Sir/madam,_

_I hope this finds you well. Before I was demoted from my functions by your brother, Monday's Dusk, I thought you would be interested by the fact he altered the sun Flowerbloom's record in order to move the defunct star to the Eternal Fields. I suspect weird activities and thus, believe you will be eager to investigate about your brother's activities._

_Your devoted former-Pravuil, 392759 in precedence, Tenth Assistant Deputy Clerk of Stars"_

So Pravuil dragged me in his fall. I was about to complete my task and someone I loosed my nerves on was able to topple me… Victory was near and I was being thwarted by that puny Denizen! I would have sent him in the Pit, if I had known! I would have slain him, I think! But… if will never forge a reality… they will only give birth to possibilities that will give birth to other possibilities… _if _only I had been aware of the consequences…


	6. No efforts are in vain Part3

No efforts are in vain

Part III

"I have failed". That was all I could say, that's was all I could think, I failed. Now I would be sent into a rank or position where I could not act or, for the worst, I would be executed. No special escort was being arranged while my brother and sister dragged me along toward Monday's Office. My hands were tied up by silvery chains and my brother, Noon, held an invisible string that was attached upon the links of the metal rope around my wrists. There were no Commissionaires and Inspectors, my siblings were far enough to stop any attempts of escape. For no reasons I knew, we stopped in the small living room before our Master's Office. It was the last time I saw it, for Monday had decided to change the look of the Dayroom.

"Sit down." Said Monday's Noon as he clicked his fingers, the chains holding my hands suddenly vanished in a sprinkle of stars. "We need to talk, brother."

His tone was cold and full of authority. A fire was raging inside of him, however, he did huge effort to contain his anger.

"How… how dare you challenge us Dusk?" Noon was snarling. "How dare you challenge Mister Monday after all he did for you!" Now he was shouting.

My silence only made his anger grow, and he was angry enough that I thought he might kill me without any process. As I did not answer, he got near me in order to slap me hard, but my sister took his arm when it nearly hit me.

"That is no way to make things, Noon." She merely said. "Besides, his comportment may not go unpunished, I must admit."

"My comportment…" I snickered. "And what about yours, going against laws, and what about Mister Monday's comportment? Breaking the Will, keeping the Key…"

I was really being slapped that time, and my sister did not interfere.

"You are no one to judge the Master, Dusk!" Noon shouted. "The Master always did great work and he keeps doing it! After all he did for you how dare you!"

"And what he did for me, brother?" I calmly asked. In fact, the question was being honest, what Monday had done so great about me?

"He kept you in your position! You know he never like you but he still let you under his services and after all that, you seek vengeance!"

I was silent. What if it was true? Maybe I should not have tried to topple him, what if I owed him? I could have been sent down into the Deep Coal Cellar, as I did to Pravuil, or I could have been sold to Grim Tuesday, as I threatened the Assistant Deputy Clerk of Stars!

"I agree his faults are high, brother Noon." Said my sister, she was clearly not knowing what to do about us too. "While it is true Dusk committed something really faulty, he did save us many times from our own crimes. We owe him… in a certain way."

"I did not ask you to help me, sister!" firmly answered Noon. "Besides, who are you to speak of crimes, you whore!"

A deathlike silence suddenly reigned over the room. The term my brother use was something really vulgar, but there was some truth in this word he used to describe my sister that wasn't entirely false…

Seeing my confused look, firmly locked in my sister's shocked one, Noon finally spoke.

"You didn't knew, did you, brother?" he said in a tone that showed he was enjoying the situation. "While you were prey to avarice, and I to wrath, our sister was being the victim of lust! Ahahahahahahahahahahaha!"

With that, Dawn left, visibly crying. When she finally left the room, I was shocked too. Not only by my brother's cold act of pure meanness but also to know that my sister did let herself plunges head first into desires of the mortal ones… We were probably the only Dawn, Noon and Dusk being prey to sin's curse… I thought only the Morrow Days suffered, or enjoyed, that. My brother left me in time too; I could have sworn that I heard him telling me: "Farewell…brother". The huge doors of Monday's Office opened. I knew they invited me to enter. It was the night, as mortals would call it, in the House, so it was impossible, though there were windows showing stars in my Master's Office, to see anything inside. All I could see was shadow, when I entered, I noticed Mister Monday behind his desk. He looked all fine, though not energetic as he used to be. Without any gestures, I knew he wanted me to sit on a chair, right in front of him. As I did, I saw the First Key in its sword form, lying on the desk. Monday was staring at it, his look only switching to me as I sat.

"I had words you tried to take over my offices, Dusk." said Mister Monday, though he did not sound angry or offended, he even sounded sad of my failure, though the reasons would only come later in my life… "I knew that was to come, Dusk, and I waited. I waited, though I should have acted far before this day. I know you managed the Lower House very well since my… well I thank you, Dusk. I really thank you."

I did not say it but I only wanted him to tell me what would be my punishment, though it was clear now he was only going to reprimand me lightly.

"I know you did not do this to betray me, boy. I know you did this because you saw that… you thought things had to change. It is clear that I wasn't… that I was busy enough to not ask you what you thought about my administration but… Now I ask you Dusk. What do you think that should change?"

At first I found it strange that he only asked me to know what things I thought should be improved, but something deep down within me forbid me to do so. I wanted to say him: "Master, leave the Key, you don't see a curse was being put upon it to punish you from your disobedience?"

"You know, my dear Dusk, I always did my best to do what I had to… but these recent millennia, I found it really hard to do so… not that it was but… You must know that sometime I am being tired of things… you can't understand and I don't ask you to. I have one question for you and I will allow you to go freely, as if nothing happened."

"What is it, Master?" I politely asked.

"Do you want to be my Steward, Dusk?"

At first, I thought he had to be joking. First of all, he could not appoint any Steward since he was not the true owner of the Key. Second thing, that request was clearly a proof of sloth. He just did not want to assume the responsibility of being the Trustee of the First Key. But then, maybe it was the chance I was asking for…

"Think about it Dusk. You could do anything under my behalf, which include doing thing right… freeing the innocents… Time is short you know, I need your answer now… then it will be t… then I will be too busy to think of the matter again. I know you always thought I would have let Noon have that position, but I ask it to you. Will you be my Steward?"

"But Master, you do not have the right to have a Steward!"

"Then I will relinquish my stat of Trustee of the Architect of All and it will be the end of it…"

"But… why do you want me to do this?"

My Master gave me a sad look… which made me doubt he now wanted to bear the Key.

"I cannot tell you Dusk, I don't have the strength to do it, but I see you do not accept. Be gone now…"

I left, confused a lot. I did not cross my brother's and sister's path. The two of them now were probably really angry after each other… My meeting with Mister Monday was really strange… he wanted me to be his Steward but why?

I did not know it but it took him a lot of efforts to summon me, a lot of courage to close the eyes on all the beautiful things he could be doing instead of summoning me forth… It required him so much energy that I had to make the first step in order to land in front of his door. A lot of time later, I realized why he wanted to get rid of the key… It was because he told it to me, but five thousand years later, when he was being defeated in single combat by the Rightful Heir…

This marks the end of another era in Monday's Fall. The next part is: The Rise of the Damned.


	7. Rise of the Damned Part1

Version 1.01

The rise of the Damned

Part I

That dream. I always had that dream. It was not scary, it was not enjoyable. I would hear a single line being said by an ominous voice and then, the void. _"The one in true shadow shall enlighten the helper of his enemy's will, for his children are in danger from those in trust of the house of his enemy."_ I did not understand the message yet, but the dream tormented me since the day the occupation of Steward of the Lower House had been offered to me. How many millennia since my journey to hell started? How many years since the Breaking of the Will occurred? Nine thousand and nine hundred years. This is the answer of both questions. Three millennia ago, my war effort to free the Part One of the Will failed. I had been depressed since that day. You know what is the problem with Denizen's trauma? It's that they are at the same scale then human ones, if a depression for a mortal can long like three months up to years, it is the same for us. I mentioned early a year was like a second for a Denizen, it is like if my depression started less then an hour ago… I was stripped from the army I build myself; they all have been converted into Inspectors or something else particularly useless, however, I had one of my lieutenants who actually came from the Reaches, who kept contact with me. He was one of the Piper children by the name of Thomas. The little half-Denizen had been converted into an Inspector, but he rarely did his job. Besides, no one would even look for him to do it. What is useful about him is that he provided me information about my brother's and sister's department, more like a spy. I learned a lot about the jail of the Will. First of all, it did was on the Flowerbloom. Second thing, it was trapped in Immaterial components that were a malachite cage, a glass box and a crystal. Useful thing about Thomas is that he was a Crafter, which means he had knowledge about Immaterial objects but above all, he had been Grim Tuesday's secret "nephew". He made me learn a lot about Nothing, but also that if something Immaterial could resist Nothing, to a certain extend, it would never resist Stabilised Fine Nothing. What was that? It is the exact question I asked him exactly nine thousand and nine hundred years after the Breaking of the Will…

Thomas risked high by still visiting me sometimes. At first, it was to appease my pain of my terrible failure, but even more of the shame I felt of refusing so lightly Mister Monday's offer… But the Master asked me when I too much off guard; I couldn't say yes just like that, I had to think! Then again, Mister Monday said he could not see me again… that meant I had to make a move again, risking being slain by my siblings that time.

"You know, Monday's Dusk, I will never pay back my debts to you." Said Thomas. "Not only you freed me from the Far Reaches, but you also gave me the position of lieutenant in your very own army and you were also ready to accept me in your council."

I sighed.

"You mean my former army, my former council…" I sadly said. "Besides, you're not even a lieutenant, you became an Inspector…"

"Which I am proud to be since I got news to give you about your great plan!" the kid happily said. "I have been sent, this morning, to inspect the Will's jail. Well at first, I was not meant to do so but! The appointed Inspector went missing so… I decided to go there in his place. The watchwords and all the protocol stuffs were given to me and… I got the exact details of the Will's prison!"

"I already know about the Bespoke Sentinels…" I grimly replied.

"I said the prison, not the jailers. I can tell you that Stabilised Fine Nothing is going to be needed… and it will have to be well hidden…"

What Thomas said intrigued me… he had devised another rescue plan for me? Definitely, mortals always surprised me. The Grim's nephew, a mere Inspector, succeeded where I, Monday's Dusk, failed to, which is, getting up and trying again… Though being Grim Tuesday's adoptive nephew was a certain honour but then again… Suddenly, the ringing of a musical watch was being heard in my room. It was not one of my watches or clocks, but Thomas' small hand-watch. It was Monday's dawn in the Secondary Realms. While his absence would probably go unnoticed, he had quite a sense of duty.

"Sorry Dusk, got to go."

"No wait! What is Stabilised Fine Nothing?"

"Short description or long one?"

"Short."

"Well I won't explain what is Stabilised Nothing, since it's simply Nothing that won't reduce anything to… well… Nothing, but Stabilised Fine Nothing is a secret Grim Tuesday is still developing. In brief, it can be given one single command it will obey after a trigger action is done. Like, suppose I order it to dissolve a little bit the first thing it will hit if someone sneeze it on the target… see what I mean? See ya!"

Nothing that obeyed one single command after a trigger action is done… like dissolving a little the target as it hits it… Why would I need it anyway? He never gave me so much information about what would be the use of a triggered-action-Nothing… besides that dream was perturbing me a lot… "Perhaps if I sleep a little I would plunge into it once more…" I thought… and I did fall asleep. Though my dream was not the one I thought…

_The room I was into was quite blurry. It was a mix of Dawn's room and mine… it had a check board cellar pattern but the usual black tiles were pink. There was a white concert piano, like the one in my elevator. The windows all around the room were four feet long and two feet large and had pink or black curtains in alternation. The ambiance was more like what Dawn liked, but the windows were showing a night full of stars, though morning light was illuminating the room. Darkness and light intertwined… My sister was sitting in a fancy armchair… it was black coloured… while mine was white coloured…_

"_What is that meaning? What trickery is this?"_

_-"Do you want me to tell you, brother?" my sister was staring at my feet, obviously unable to face my eyes. "We actually are crossing the same path… the path of light… while I am not aware of what is happening in the Lower House, you seem to know. I don't know who I must follow… Noon or you? I am being torn apart between two choices… keeping things as they are or making a move… I lost confidence in myself…"_

_-"Why are you actually saying this to me sister, to my reckoning, you let Noon strike me the second time he lunged for my face…"_

_-"This is why I am unsure… What Noon had done… what I had done…? There is something I must tell you, brother…"_

_I stood silent. I and my siblings never used "dream-talk" as we called it unless we had something very secret to say to each other… that meant Dawn was really troubled…_

"_Brother, forgive me, but I read your record. Wholly."_

_I was stunned. We never officially agreed on that but common sense made Dawn, Noon and I never read each others record…_

"_Don't say anything Dusk, but when someone see what she did herself from the view of someone else, her way of thinking changes… I don't know what to do… I don't know what to think… but please, do something…"_

_And with that, she disappeared._

What was her goal of that visit? I might never know… but she did give me an idea… I ran for my elevator, entered it quickly and pressed the single button I always pressed wherever I wanted to go. I quickly arrived in "The Very Private Monday's Dusk's Office". I reached for one of my bookshelves and took the "Whatever thing you can read book". This little marvel of magic allowed me to get whatever thing that could be read… that included thoughts. Of course there were some restrictions but I could get the paper I wanted… Monday's Dawn record. I did not wish to strike back at Dawn, but she gave me an idea. While it was sure she never had the same dream that perturbed me, she might have an idea of whoever might be in "true" shadow. Noon wasn't a reference for he judged anyone except himself as low beings, so everyone except him was in shadow. In addition, Dawn always had been the voice of wisdom in my head. She might have thought about shadow one or two times at least in her whole existence… I began my reading…

_Monday's Dawn Record_

_When the Architect first…._ I could skip the few first thousand years… it was not that I could not read them at light speed but I preferred to jump that part. _She then asked for pudding and reached for the…_ I wonder why records, well, record everything we do… _after the nice race with…_ yeah… as if the rabbit stood a chance…_ learned many things from him however, she thought he…_ damn… really…. I wonder if "my" record was full of those useless details… then again it was meant to record whatever I did… ok. It asked for it… I used all the powers I had to read at an amazing speed… (for a mortal) and stopped only when I saw the word shadow. I wrote down the most interesting paragraphs and it gave…

…_she is not afraid of shadow because she knows her brothers will always be there…_ not that one…

…'_d not like to be in shadow as her brother is, then again, he seems to…_ Well I do not think my dream referred to me as being in the true shadow…

_...as she struck the nasty shadow Nithling with her sword…_ entertaining but I got no time for that…

… _her blade crossed the shadow-like one of Dusk._ I could not pass that one… it was mentally impossible…

…_true shadow is when someone suffers daily. Dawn began to wonder if she suffered daily… was Monday's Dusk right to think they all have been wrong? And what if she was the only cause of her own sufferings? Was she standing in true shadow? The one where no one can help you? The one when someone offers the light of smiles to you, you still are in a dark place?_

Someone who suffered daily… someone that even the brightest smile could not make happy… more like…

_What if she was someone like the Old one? "No," she thought, "I am not suffering like the Old One. It would be being an egoist to think that…"_

Author's note: YES! YES I DID SAY I FINISHED MONDAY'S TALE BUT! Marketing facts show that if I make you wait, you will enjoy far more the fic so... I will not publish the remnant chapters all like that! aha! something new here, an organized writer... the one who gets 2 or 3 chapters so he can relax after a bit... no, its more like the author who likes to write 2 or 3 chapters at the same time. It is highly possible that this chapter and the next are full of syntax errors or grammar or blah blah blah but... I will see to it... later.


	8. Rise of the Damned Part2

The rise of the Damned

Part II

The Old One… This is the one who was described as being in true shadow, by my sister. Indeed, that was fitting… there was almost no light in the Deep Coal Cellar and being eternally tortured is probably what I would call a dark existence... But I doubted he would want to help me, a Denizen. A faithful servant of the Architect, his enemy… enemy…_ enemy…_

"_The one in true shadow shall enlighten the helper of his enemy's will, for his children are in danger from those in trust of the house of his enemy."_

I quickly woke up. It was the first time I was day dreaming, but the description was fitting… The Old One was living a dark existence and had to enlighten the helper of the Architect's Will… If we supposed that I was the helper of the Will, he would help because his children are in danger… It says from those in trust of the house of his enemy… the Morrow Days are in trust of the House… but who are the children of the Old One? Lord Sunday, the Mariner, the Pied Piper, who else? One single piece of the puzzle was yet to uncover… apart from that, I knew I had to speak to him.

A single elevator arrived in the Up Coal Cellar. It was coming from upper floors. As the elevator light beam landed, a few dozen of Commissionaires marched forward the landing site of the elevator. A prisoner was about to be received, yet protocol ordered the Lower House law enforcers to prevent escape, though it was rather improbable. As they approached and formed a square around the elevator, the doors opened, revealing a very beautiful room, with a particular night ambiance. It seemed that Monday's Dusk brought a personal prisoner, although no one could be seen. In such case, the Commissionaires were to enter the room and help the superior, assuming that this one had trouble with the future Cellar worker. Adopting an offensive triangle position, they entered the room, their sergeant first stepping inside the magnificent room. It was empty, no sign of battles… The Sergeant gave his troops the order to form a circular defensive position all around him. Something was particularly wrong here. First, the fact that Monday's Dusk was not allowed to go here, order of Monday's Noon, but also that an elevator never landed somewhere if no one was inside, even if that person pressed the floor button and quickly got out. As the officer of the mechanized soldiers thought of that, he got hit hard by the flat side of a blade… as he fell on the ground, he noticed the sword was completely black as the darkest night. As soon the Sergeant's body hit the ground, the Commissionaires turned toward the middle of the circle and saw Monday's Dusk, who did not let them the time to react and flapped his wings, causing a small gust that blew away a dozen of Commissionaires, breaking a lot of them. The remaining force inside the elevator adopted defensive stances. If they got the right to order Monday's Dusk to exit this Floor, they did not have the right to harm him. It was in their power to report his disobedience but first, they had to be fully operational to do that. Somewhat, they doubted being sliced by a Frozen Moonlight Sword would not compromise that criteria.

As the mechanical troopers saw me, I made my wings appear and flapped them to gust away a few Commissionaires away, breaking most of them. I opposed the remaining ones to a barrage of blows, giving all I could to damage them the most, even if one slash was enough to render one non-operational. I had to break them down the most possible to break the memory piece in them. As I used my full combat abilities, every Commissionaire that were in the elevator were reduced to rubbles. Another wave came in, and decided to use an offensive position against me. "No use…" I thought. I merely disappeared and reappeared behind them, letting them realize what hit them in that fraction of second. I had been moving so fast that the second they knew I slashed all of them, their chest were falling on the ground, the legs still standing up. I realized that my move didn't prevent them from sounding the alarm, though I doubted it was in their power to report my presence. Another wave reached me. This time, their number was around the forties if not the fifties, and they no longer used disciplined position, they saw they were not about to prevail using those techniques, the bodiless legs behind me proved it. As they savagely attacked me, I used every ounce of energy at my disposal to parry, dodge and block the hundreds of blows coming straight at me, all at once. Ducking, stepping aside, deflecting blows and striking back, I defeated every Commissionaires of that wave. As some tried lower attacks, I simply back-flipped and threw my sword at them like a boomerang. I stroke down many of my foes doing so and slain a bonus Commissionaire when my sword came back to my hand, like a flashing arrow. The next wave counted at the least a hundred blue coated mechanical men. Deciding I had to practice my speed, I attacked them one by one, sending flurries of blows at every opponents. They blocked most of the slashes, cuts and lunges but the few blows that reached their marks made it fall very quickly. I probably putted half of the small army to its knee using that technique, but now it was time to get serious. I flew up in the air, waiting for them to do the same. Now my strategy could have been described as this. Give the first blow, if it fails, block the second and deliver the fatal strike. Each mechanized warrior slapped their own wings on their back and flew toward me to engage me into combat. Seen from afar, that battle looked like a huge gang of doves flying toward a single crow and that crow was fending off every single dove, cutting one wing, causing the winged-warrior falling too quickly into the Deep Coal Cellar. That crow was dealing fatal cuts to most of the doves, sending them also into the huge hole just under them. I was the perfect warrior compared to the Commissionaires. That day, it was raining metal in the Coal Cellar. Legs, halves of complete Commissionaires, chest, heads, arms, any parts imaginable of these disciplined law enforcers fell into the Deep Coal Cellar, and a very few landed on the cliff. As the big battle ended, I landed back near my long gone elevator's landing place. I had to toss away evidences of the fight. It would take days before the "mysterious" lack of security here would be noticed. And for the Sergeant in responsibility of that small legion, I cut his head off and kicked his body into the chasm. For the head, I simply buried it. I would come and save him once the Rightful Heir would come to arrive. I also sent the mechanical limbs and bodies of the Commissionaires into the pit by generating powerful winds with my wings.

"These were no great challenge weren't they, brother?"

It was Dawn.

"I will close my eyes on this and never speak of it, not until all is over, although I don't know what is this "all". " My sister said.

"Why are you here, Dawn." I calmly asked.

"I knew you would have skipped every parts of my record except those where the word "shadow" was present, so I arranged myself to use it in my thoughts when I thought of all what was happening in the House. You are not the only who I help…"

"Noon…" I grimly said.

"I decided I would do the balance between the two of you. I shall help you, but also hinder you. I challenge you Dusk. Win, and I will be silent. But if you come to loose, I will tell everything to Noon, and will take care that Mister Monday do not come to your defence this time. "

"If you help Noon as directly you do with me, it's no longer the time to stake your silence." I said coldly.

"It is why I do not help him directly. Otherwise, nothing would be balanced."

"First blood?" I offered.

She merely nodded. She reached for her sword, though there was only thin air in front of her. He weapon materialized in a flash of light, and I soon looked upon no empty hand, but upon a sword of pure light. Not white, rather yellow. We flew high up and exchanged blows at a training speed (compare it to human maximum speed). We did so for a few seconds and after, we were only blurs charging at each others. It was a particular sight, a black winged man fighting a perfectly pink woman in a sword fight. The clashing of our swords was being heard everywhere in the Cellar, even in the Deep. We fastened our pace to such points that the sound being heard all around was late to describe the battle. While you could hear me parrying a blow, I was already striking back. Even the light was too slow to keep reflecting on us. If you had the power, you would have seen me trusting my sword at my sister's chest, but in truth, we were already somewhere else exchanging fast blows. This was hard to avoid being hit, for I never fought my sister. I duelled Noon in friendly fights sometimes, and fought with him as ally sometimes, when I had troubles cleaning up the Realms from Nithlings, however, never with my sister. She had a completely different style, faster, more fluid, more precise, more like "mine". She was relying on accuracy and speed rather then on raw strength and guard breaking moves. I finally managed to get a clean cut upon her neck, but only pink hairs flew away, no blood. Knowing that she was charging me from behind, I let me fall far away from her. Good move, for when I looked up, I saw a surprised pink angel, thinking that victory was at hand, but that in truth, it only was the beginning. I stood still, my sword in hand, my eyes closed. I was almost meditating, but my sister knew it was no opportunities to deal a winning blow, for she knew I had reached an energy level far higher then the usual one I kept when I gave my maximum into a fight. If she moved toward me, I would simply have unleashed my fury. Suddenly, my sister blocked attacks from an invisible force. While I didn't budge from an inch, it was only an illusion because of "light-lag" for I was unleashing a wild flurry of blows upon my sister. The battle between I and Noon, few millennia ago did not get that intense for we underestimated each other, but it was a wholly new experience for Dawn and I. As a scratch upon her right sleeve was being visible, and that a mere drop of golden blood fell toward the Deep Coal Cellar, we both stopped. Taking no care of our pose, we were flying simply enough, a polite distance between us.

"I suppose you win then." Said my sister. She did not seem to have difficulties to breath as she spoke, but when she was silent, she "did" was breathing hard.

"Well played." I simply said. And I made no effort to keep staying at this altitude, I let my weary wings act at a parachute, and it was the end of it.

My fall seemed to be hours, yet, it probably was shorter since I was too weary to keep my wings flapping. I made them disappear and I fell the few miles remaining before I landed really hardly in a pond of dirty water, full of coal particles. As I landed head first, a mortal would probably have died, even if the landing was on both feet. I got up and using my last reserves of energy I still had, cleaned my clothes. If Dawn and Noon were able to not administrate their department, a single absence of mine would not be that bad. I knew the Old One was captive here for the eternity but where? The one I crossed answered me, but it wasn't someone I wanted to see before a long time…

"Pravuil." I coldly said as I approached him.

"Monday's Dusk, sir." The Denizen replied, as if he was about to cry. "You came here to finish what you started?"

"What would that be?"

"My punishment."

"I might, but I will not. Tell me where the Old One is."

The Denizen took no time to answer me. He pointed me a direction and continued to pile coal. He obviously hated me and knowing what meant annihilation, would probably tried to convince someone else to not go there, but I was probably his worst enemy, and who in the whole universe did not want the worst thing to happen to his enemy?

When I got bored of walking, I hovered over the ground, using my wings weakly as possible. I finally got somewhere full of a mystic blue light… as I got nearer, I saw him. The Old One. My battle with the Commissionaire legion and my sister must have lasted longer then I thought for the prison clock showed it was twelve (I won't describe it, you know what it is…1), probably for midnight, since I heard a terribly loud belt being ranged twenty-four times. The show did not impress me, but it was not a good one. The Clock Marchers, as they were named, got over the Old One's chest and using their tools, took "care" of his eyes. No scream, only a deathlike silence after two "spash" were being heard. The Clock Marchers then simply got back where they had to. The Old One could do no physical harms to me while he was in that position, however, I knew he could still kill me with a single thought from his part. I did not see him well, and I think it was better to be like this.

"It would actually have been funny to see you try rescuing me, little Denizen." The ominous voice of the eyeless man said. "Now I would have annihilated anyone who came to me by now, even more a Denizen, yet, I think I will let you a chance to escape. Go."

"I think the safety of your children will be an important matter for you."

"My three sons fare very well."

"What about the mortals? If Mister Monday falls, a lot of your children of you and the Architect will die."

"And what do you want from me, Monday's Dusk." the Old One tone was a cold one.

_"The one in true shadow shall enlighten the helper of his enemy's will, for his children are in danger from those in trust of the house of his enemy." _I replied.

"That line has but one sense… and yet it was well said. Now you succeeded in entertaining me a little. Ask a single question and it will be the help of the one in true shadow."

"What must I do to free the Part One of the Will."

"The Greed One's nephew answered that question. Go now, and I also give you that hint, nightly one. Keep all you know about "your" struggle into the deepest silence."

Why I had to be silent about it? I don't know… maybe because the Rightful Heir was a mortal and that I had no right to interfere with them… in that case, the number of those who will know my story will be small… very small. I left the Coal Cellar quickly as possible. After that, I headed for my office. First thing I did: summon the Greed One's nephew…

1: The Old One prison is a clock face on the ground with roman numerals. Each hands of the clock are chained and the Old One's wrists have manacles linked to the chains. There are two trapdoors near the center of the clock. This is where the Clock Marchers go in/out.

Author's note: Strikes blows… I don't know other synonyms… errrr… I lack vocabulary do I? Anyway… I don't want to write Tuesday… I got too much idea's for Wednesday already… I can already tell there will have something to do with Feverfew and a sprinkle of vengeance and a little bit of love, if I find a way to put that into it… By any means, I have far more ideas for a avenging lover story rather then a greedy copier of stuff… see what I mean… and try to guess who is the avenging lover…


	9. Rise of the Damned Part3

TAKE NOTE! There is a scene from the book directly! It is the one when Dusk comes out of the Weirdway. It is "not" mine! It is owned by Garth Nix and if he feels good to make it disappear from this site, well he can do that! I get no credits until Dusk and Noon crash hard on the ground.

The rise of the Damned

Part III

One hundred years ago, I met the Old One. He said me that in order to accomplish my goal, I needed Thomas. He did his job well. The kid gladly crafted me a snuff box and infused every part of it, snuff and box, with Stabilised Fine Nothing. The trigger action was sneezing, the command was dissolve lightly first thing it lands on. It worked. The Inspector I gave the box was the one appointed to check the Will's prison and as he sneezed, the Nothing did its job. The obstacles of the Will's escape were all weakened, it was free to go, and go it did. Though the Lower House was being a little bit shaken, it wasn't too much. Now I had to wait, the Rightful Heir was trapped in the Deep Coal Cellar. I met him and gave him advices, but I couldn't do more. After I met the Will and told him my plan to reach the Dayroom. The plan1 was adopted. I had to wait that Arthur, the Heir, was free, and I felt that soon, all would be over. I had been fighting for almost ten thousand years to keep orders and yet, it took me so much time to realize how wrong the things got… I was watching the boy's progress using ways only I knew. When I saw him finally reach Monday's Antechamber, I jumped out of my seat, used a private Weirdway and reappeared in Monday's Dayroom. No longer had it looked like a very old library with living rooms inside it, it was now full of steam baths or mud baths, in brief, it was a bath complex. I noticed my brother that was leaving the room as I entered it. He seemed in a hurry, for he summoned his wings before even exiting the place. I had a bad feeling about this… I also got out of the Dayroom, just when I saw him cross the bridge that led to the Antechamber. I thought I had an idea where to find him… I went to the opposite side of the Dayroom, where another Weirdway was waiting for me. The L-shaped roman villa that was the Dayroom now was surrounded by a steaming lake, which was over a lava lake. All that water could not evaporate totally because of some magic in it… I summoned my wings, and I flew high up. As I was over the land, the steaming anti-flyers system could not fire at me, though it could prepare a bubble for me bellow the Dayroom. As that bubble would explode, a blast of steam would be propelled up at an amazing speed. I would be blown away, if not killed, if I was hit. It would be hard to dodge, even for a Denizen like me. I took a deep breath and jumped high. When I reached the maximum height my jump would lead me too, I flapped my perfectly dark wings, and I build up speed. I needed it to dodge the bubble-blast. As soon I was over the lake, the bubble popped out from under the Dayroom, and exploded, releasing the super-heated steam. I narrowly dodged the column of water vapour, but as soon that bubble burst, another formed and exploded as soon I flapped my wings once more. I kept dodging the bursts of steam, sometime they exploded right in front of me and I had to make a complete stop avoid being completely exploded by the steam. At such speed, it would rip off my flesh from my body. I finally reached the narrow edge where the Weirdway was, hidden as a triangular rock which stood horizontally on the wall. I pressed it and a dark hole opened in the wall. I did not wait that the Weirdway lead me to the meeting point with the Will and the Heir, I ran across the dark jelly-like tunnel until I reached its light absorbing exit. As I got out, my brother was there, Arthur and Suzy Turquoise Blue in front of him.

"It's a trap! What do we do now?" whispered Arthur.

"All three of you need to step a little forward." I said

"_Ah my brother, you were always full of surprise."_ Said my brother to me in thoughts. He thought I had come here to help him.

"And be more trusting." I said to Arthur as I stepped before him. Noon frowned. He spoke to me through my mind as I reached for my sword.

"_Perhaps too full or surprises…"_

My brother finally spoke to me directly.

"What is this Dusk?" he stormed. "I am to have the Key!"

"No brother." I gently replied. "We will let them go on their way."

"Traitor!" Noon hissed. "Step aside!"

"No." I said. "I am loyal to the Architect and Her Will."

End of conversation. My brother threw his sword like a spear, aiming Suzy's neck. I and the Heir tried to deflect it, only I succeed where he failed. I stoke the sword hard and sent it flying away. My brother called it back with his mind and it flew into his hand, transforming few tea chests into infernos in its passage. Noon attacked the young Ink Filler once more, but I deflected his attack. I then engaged him into combat, we were moving too fast for a mortal to follow, but we were not yet giving our best. My brother ordered his Commissionaires to charge. After a few cuts and slashes, all blocked or parried, I heard the Will shout something. I ducked one of my brothers cut and gripped Noon's arm. I threw him over my head and he spun in a somersault. My brother kept going up.

"Go!" I ordered the Heir his small party. "We will hold Noon as long as we can."

I then flew high up myself, to meet Noon falling strike. As our blades crossed, we got back and kept fighting as we were falling. As we finally struck the ground, the hit unleashed a powerful shockwave that knocked down everyone to the ground. My brother got out of the debris before me and I heard him order his troops to close the weirdway and slay the Ink Filler. As I got out myself, I saw Noon firing a fire blast toward the still open Weirdway. One of the few Midnight Visitors I brought with me sent a sonic boom meet the blast. While it was not enough to dissipate it completely, it weakened the fire missile attack. It never reached the Weirdway as it closed.

My brother slowly turned away from the black doorway. As he finally was facing me, I was up to my feet me too. The battle around us stopped as we faced.

"This time, your farewell will be forever, brother." He seemed quite calm, but beneath his calm face, I could almost see the raging fire of his anger.

"You lost the right to call me brother long ago!" I shouted back. Then I remembered that day he first killed a mortal.

We both flew high up. I knew that my few Midnight Visitors would hold the Commissionaires back, even if a lot of persons would say it is impossible because they were outnumbered. I chose them carefully. They were my elite guard. When I reached one hundred meters of altitude, Noon began his assault. We were moving so fast the only thing that someone looking at us would see would be white flashes of light as our blade crossed, and that same persons would only be able to hear loud bangs. We were really giving our best. While I did not desired to slay Noon, I soon came to the conclusion that I had to kill him or give up. We were evenly matched, if one had the upper hand for a few minutes, the other would take it back a few cuts later. It was like this until a silver plate suddenly appeared just like that in the middle of the battle down bellow, the Commissionaires and Midnight Visitors were fighting with the same intensity that I and Noon had, so they did not notice the Transfer Plate, though they all stopped the struggle as Monday's Dawn suddenly appeared too and stepped off the plate. I finally kicked Noon hard in his belly, making him back off. I flew down near Dawn, using that small amount of time I had won.

"Dawn help me please! Don't you see how the things got wrong since the Breaking of the Will?" I was shouting in exasperation. She looked stunned at first, but then her eyes widened and her mouth opened…

The fire blade dug itself exactly where I was… a few fractions of seconds too late.

"Don't listen to him, sister!" replied Noon. "He only wishes to topple Mister Monday!"

And he resumed his wild attack. As I did my best to block all the blows, I heard my sister say:

"Can't we talk before attacking each other?" she begged.

"No time to speak! Choose, help that traitor Dusk, or I who is still loyal to our Master, Mister Monday!"

"And were you loyal to your Creator, Noon?" I angrily said. "I don't try to topple Mister Monday, I try to free him!"

"Free him? From what!" shouted back my brother.

"A curse has been put upon him! Not only he is lazy now, he is also tired, which is abnormal! Don't you see that the best thing we can do for him would be to make him relinquish the Key!" I replied.

"And I suppose you wish that it would be given to you? Dusk?" hissed Noon.

"At first I wanted it to be so, but now I know the Key must go to the Rightful Heir!" I said.

"I think he is right, Noon…" timidly said Dawn.

As she finished her sentence, Noon rushed toward her and put his blade around her neck.

"No don't!" I screamed in surprise.

Dawn didn't move at all. She was obviously too surprised to do so.

"One false move, sister, and I send you back to Nothing! Give up, Dusk, or I shall kill our sister!"

It was risky, but I had to try persuade him it would not help him… I looked all around us, the struggle between our troops had ended. Everyone was looking with interest, except the mechanical Commissionaires.

"If you kill her, you no longer have a shield." I said calmly.

"If I kill her, you will be so sad you will not even stand to your feet. You will beg me to finish you." Noon hissed.

"Or I will be so mad that I will put an end to your existence before she even drops dead…" I said. It was getting to risky for Dawn's life… that debate had to stop now. Dawn's neck was beginning to burn, my brother used his willpower to hold the flames from burning my sister, but now he was _really _going to kill her. I dropped my weapon on the ground and it "clanged" loudly.

"Compassion was always your weakness, brother." Said Noon.

And with that, he stabbed me in the chest. I gasped as the blade pierced me. I fell on my knees as it got out of my body. I heard my sister scream and she was able to get off Noon's hold. As soon he let go, I saw a flash of light. Noon was now facing Dawn. I used every bit of energy I had to get up. My sister was loosing, it was so obvious. She never had the fighting spirit anyway; she was more like those girls in the Secondary Realms, those who were afraid of anything or nothing… This time, only this time I wished I could have a sister that looked more like Wednesday's Dawn, cold and effective, more like Noon but in a more flexible way. My brother was more cruel and half-effective. My thoughts were stopped as I heard Dawn screaming in anticipation of the blade that was going to pierce her throat. I suddenly felt a wave of energy. My siblings too seemed to feel it; Noon had stopped moving just when his blade was going to kill Dawn, who stopped screaming just when I felt the energy.

The Key was now in the hands of the Rightful Heir, and for the first time, Arthur had used it. Everyone who had strong links with the Key or with someone closely related to the Key had felt it.

Noon made his sword disappear.

"Was… was I… hum…" my brother was speechless. It was like if he had awakened from a nightmare.

My sister too seemed to be confused a little, but far less then Noon. Me, really felt the same.

"I think there are people who wait for us up there, don't you think, brother?"

We all took an elevator for the Dayroom, and we arrived near the side of the villa. As we all walked to reach the Rightful Heir, I gave a look to Noon who was close behind me. He looked dejected and sad. He was obviously thinking of what he had done. Something blinded him during ten thousand years… what, I can't tell. Dawn was behind a crowd of Commissionaires, Inspectors and a few other persons who were in the elevator as we entered it. She was unreadable. I did not know what she was thinking about.

After the Master left, I got back to my elevator. I watched carefully its furniture. The black curtains of the huge windows, the paints of me and Mister Monday… It was the last time I was looking at it with this furniture, so I took a photo as I exited. Sure I could always look back at it through the record of someone who accompanied me into it, and it also was a mark of a dark time, but also of a short one when I was happy that Mister Monday had the Key. I entered my Office and all the places I worked in the Dusk Department, and stealthily took photos of that too. I did with my room too. It was the last time I was Mister Monday's Dusk.

Author's note: there is a few lines that are owned by the Lego company. They were take from: Bionicle 2 the movie. They are: "_This time, your farewell will be forever, brother", "You lost the right to call me brother long ago", "Compassion was always your weakness, brother". _There is an epilogue.

1: The plan is to reach the Antechamber, then go to the Weirdway location and then reaching the Dayroom using the spider wire.


	10. Monday's Rise

Administrative meeting

EPILOGUE OF MONDAY'S TALE

I gave my siblings an invitation. I gave Mister Monday an invitation. We all had to meet in the Dayroom, in the living room in front of Dame Primus' office. We were busy as hell in the Lower House, now that the Steward of the Rightful Heir had been appointed, but we all managed to free ourselves for this small meeting. My brother was the first after myself to be at the rendez-vous point.

"Greetings, brother" I said.

"Hi Dusk" he said."… I mean Noon."

I gave him a slight smiled. He definitely was full of remorse and needed to be supported until his wounds would fully heal.

"Noon? You call me Noon, brother? Noon is not my name. It is only my position. My name is still Monday's Dusk as it always has been and you may refer me as Dusk whenever you speak to me" I said.

He seemed surprised at first but he agreed with a smile and a nod. Dawn entered the huge living room a little after.

"So we still call you Dusk? I thought you had enough of the name." She said as Mister Monday entered.

"I had enough of the position. Besides, I have no name apart of Monday's Dusk." I replied. "Good day, Mister Monday."

"Speaking of name, sir, you may no longer call me Mister Monday, for it is not my name anymore." he said, quite frankly. "You now have to call me Maurice Moon."

"Why did you summon us here, brother?" asked Dawn.

"It was to have a last administrative meeting." I said.

"Very well." Said Maurice, smiling. "What are the points for today?"

"What we all done in that story." I said, smiling too. "There was my war effort…"

"My silence and all the trouble I caused to Dusk…" said Dawn. She was also smiling, as if all what happened was already forgiven, which was right.

"And Pravuil who I bought, in addition to the duels I had with Dusk." Said Noon. I knew it was not easy for him to speak of that, but I think we all needed to know what part we all did in the last ten thousand years.

I blinked twice as he mentioned his hiring of Pravuil… I laughed.

"I didn't know you used him… besides I now feel a little ashamed from my unfair acts toward him…" I said

"Fear not, he is no longer a Coal Collator. Although he do not have his old job, it is still better then piling coal" said Maurice. Even if he was lower then us in the hierarchy, we still had a lot of respect for him.

"And you, what did you do in all that?" asked Dawn to the former Monday. "All what happened was concerning you; I think you probably did something."

"ah… You know, I really was prey to sloth, I did nothing at all." Said Mister Monday. He smiled and laughed a little. "Now I believe you all have some occupations? I would not want you to get into troubles because you want to make me happy. Go now."

Dawn and Noon bowed for the last time before Monday, and left us alone in the living room before Dame Primus' office. It was not the same living room then the one before Monday's office, but it was quite similar. It was still a place full of memories…

"I did do something in that tale, Dusk." finally said Maurice. "Do you know why I asked you to be my Steward?"

The answer I had been waiting for too long…

"I wanted to free myself… using all the willpower I had, I chased away all my sloth was ordering me. I did that by convincing me that if I relinquished any responsibilities toward the Key, I would have to do nothing for eternity but deep down, I wished to free myself. In my sleep I was aware of what I was doing, when I was awake, I wanted to sleep. But I thank you, for you freed me, Monday's Dusk…"

And with that he left me.

"Farewell, Monday's Noon! I hope you will be free sometimes, I'd like to invite you to tea sometimes." Said my former Master before he left me.

This was why he wanted me to be the Steward…

After the last administrative meeting I ever had with Mister Monday, I got back to my occupations. While the era of a Trustee ruling the Lower House was past, it would still remain in my memory, and in this tale. I now look forward for all the joy I have to share with my brother and sister.

ahem

ahem

Author's note: MAAAAAAAANNNNN who are they to slow me down that much! anyway. Tuesday is progressing slowly while I think Wednesday is going to be spectacular. This be the end of Monday's Tale.


	11. The Grim's Diary Part1

The Grim's Diary

Part I

You, yes you. You are about to read the magnificent Diary of Grim Tuesday himself. This means you paid the fifty gold Nobles to buy "my" diary wrote by myself, the Grim. The book is single paged so you don't have to flip the pages; there is even a live-it-yourself feature to be used by Denizens who wants to live my story! Yes, the fifty Nobles + taxes were really worth it. Now I shall start from the beginning of my story, with the start of it.

All began after I left the Eternal Fields. I left behind me the beautiful place full of flowers. The Architect was so creative; I never would have been able to even invent something like She did. My gaze was fixed on the silver gauntlets that were given to me. They were bound in gold, a real piece of art. I was to relinquish these gloves but I never did. I was now in charge of the Far Reaches and my ideas where clear. I would also create things for peoples to enjoy them, like the Architect. I would do what I never could before, be a Creator. I quickly stepped on the Transfer Plate and quickly arrived at the Grand Cavern. In front of me was a lake of Nothing, completely controlled. This was where I watched the Architect creating things from Nothing, I was completely obsessed about doing as Her, now it was my turn. I called a gobbet of Nothing, and caught it easily. Too easily too, perhaps the Key was helping me in my task. Then I began to think about what I would create or invent. I kept thinking and pondering about something new, yet I could not figure out something that never existed before. "Probably I should think of something more basic… a sculpture perhaps…" I thought. So I concentrated myself and…

Nothing. The gobbet grew luminous but never transformed into anything. I was trying to think about what would look like my sculpture, yet I could not see it in my head. I thought I should have created something randomly so I tried, yet to fail again and to meet a void in my mind. I could "not" think of something I never saw before.

"How revolting! How can't I think of something new!" I shouted out loud.

"Perhaps you should think of something that inspires you, Master." Answered a voice behind me. It was Tuesday's Noon. He had his black hairs in pony tail behind his head and wore a brown leather great coat and some leather pants.

"And what would that be?" I calmly asked. Noon always wanted the best for me, so I always expected he would challenge my orders if he thought it would be better for me.

"Well, though it is contrary to the Original Law but perhaps you will find something interesting in the Secondary Realms…"

"Disobey the Original Law? But the punitions to this are…"

"Not to be given. As I recall, the Architect is not meant to be here?"

"It is not like you to dare challenge laws… it looks like more…"

"Like Dusk?" said another voice. Contrary to what most peoples would have thoughts, Dusk's hairs were long and white. A strange contrast with his dark clothes, they were like Noon's but in black leather. "In fact, it was my idea for I thought that if we were two to support the idea, you would accept it with more ease. I now acknowledge you dislike it and think it is ridiculous."

"Ah… I see. Well… I am no eager to do so but…"

"Even Dawn gave her approval…" Said my second in command, Dusk. As he did, he showed me a scroll signed by Tuesday's Dawn, confirming what he said.

"Well… I don't know... The Original Law exists; it is because it has a reason… Besides I got no time for such things. I won't go to mortal worlds only because I lack inspiration. End of the line."

Dusk always was a leader, and some thought he was really in charge, since he was giving me most of the ideas. Noon, for his part, always wanted my best and opposed Dusk if he felt his ideas would harm me. Dawn was more reclusive… She seemed, for the time I met her, to only agree, never give her opinion.

After that small time I gave myself to think about my administration, I got back to the bills, salary and other things like that I had to sort out. Elevator service… 18932 gold Nobles… phone service… 73829 gold Nobles or really near that number… the telegraph service asks a budgetary augmentation… 10000 Nobles… if I pass that, that, this, this, that, this this that this that that and this… it makes 12,398,457,657 gold Nobles… In brief we have a debt of 2,493,273,293 Nobles all over the House, and it was only for the first starting century of my administration…

I watched around me, and noticed how the furniture of my office fitted my personality, as if it had been made exactly for me. There were golden curtains around windows that were showing the Eternal Fields, the floor had a quite simple decorative pattern. There were bookshelves and a few pieces of arts in a display case. I kept looking around until someone entered the room and waited.

"Excuse me, Master Tuesday?"

It was Dawn. She was waiting in front of my open door. She was wearing the same outfit then her brothers, except the leather was white.

"What is it?" I calmly asked.

"There are a hundred Piper's children waiting to have a job appointed to them." She replied.

"And… ah I suppose I'm here to seal all the necessary papers?"

"Yes, sir."

The handsome Denizen accompanied me outside of my office, through my elevator, and to the numerous lines of mortal human children that were lining for a few hundred yards…

"hem… hopefully it is not like I had to pay for the seals…" I said, when I noticed the many hundred of kids who had to have their papers sealed…

For most of the after-noon, I sealed papers and wished good-luck to mortals. Though they seemed impatient, I was not. It is to say they had a lot shorter life then mine and that time was not long for them. A few kids were looking anxious and nervous, and a smaller amount of them were sad, wishing to go home.

"They do not seem to be happy to be here. Perhaps you could introduce them to the House and its ways?" I asked to Dawn, stood at my side since the start of the sealing of papers.

She did not answer, however she did as I asked. I went back to my papers, wondering how I would repay all those debts… why the Far Reaches had the emptiest bank account in the whole House? Why did we not have a little more money? My thoughts were cut once more as Dawn entered the room again.

"Excuse me Master Tuesday." She said, with her soft voice, rather empty of emotion... "I got a small problem with one of the Piper's children, and since my brothers are not eager to help, I was wondering if you could help me."

"I suppose I could. I was not exactly doing anything anyway." She once again followed me and we once again got to the outside of the Dayroom.

Basically, every Morrow Day had a Dayroom, which they converted in something else often. For my part, I wanted a glass pyramid with my offices inside.

"Where is that child?" I asked.

"There." She pointed a boy who climbed in a tree and who was crying there. "He will not get down."

"As I recall you have wings." I replied, not coldly but not warmly either.

"I feared that forcing him to get down would have angered you, Master…" she answered back, fear and sadness evident in her voice.

"Don't get anxious for this, dear. I'm not a monster!" I said cheerfully. "It is not like I was going to hit you because of that, Dawn. Anyway, you boy, float over here!"

The power of my Key made my orders come true. He was trying to fight back the force that pulled him in front of me, kicking and scratching thin air, but he stopped and landed on his feet as he finally got in front of me.

"Is that all you wanted?" I asked.

"No, I thought you could also try to cheer him up a little since all my tries resulted in me kicking at me and or running away forcing me to organize a search."

"I see… I suppose I will handle it then! Follow me, young man."

I left Dawn behind, as the boy followed me. He was wearing a green jacket with a white shirt under it. His brown pantaloon was the same colour then his shoe, and he had a tan beret over his red haired head.

"So, you gave Dawn some problems?"

"Dawn… what a stupid name…" muttered the boy. My eyes widened as he said that.

"May I inquire why you are so unwilling to live in the House?"

"The House… that name too is stupid an un-original…" he muttered again.

"Well I wouldn't have called them Miss Cherry Fruitedelypop Tuesday's Dawn and The Marvelous Center of the Universe commonly called the House but perhaps it is your way to think?" I said chuckling. The boy smiled slightly. "Now that we sorted out that problem of names, what is yours?"

"I'm Thomas."

"And I'm Tuesday. I suppose you think it is a stupid name too, but we won't bother about that now. What make you so unwilling to live in the Far Reaches of the House?"

"I want to go back home."

"It is not in our power to actually do that since it is an higher being who brought you here, and I suppose the Piper had his reasons to bring you here. Besides I'm sure you will have much more fun here then in the Secondary Realms."

"Secondary Realms?" Thomas asked.

"Your world, as you would call it, is one of the many Secondary Realms observed and recorded here in the House. The House contains the records of these Realms. You would call it a library where the books are the story of these Realms. Now am I right to think you were sad of something when I made you float?"

"My whole family is dead. I won't tell how."

"Oh… that's quite sad. I suppose I… I'm sorry. I never quite understood death yet I'm sure it is not an happy thing… Perhaps there is something I might do to make you happy?"

"… a new family…" the boy sobbed.

"Oh…" I said uncomfortably. I never knew how I would have felt it Dawn, Noon and Dusk died all in a sudden. They were like my family… "And what would be a new family for you?"

"A brother, an uncle… something like it" the boy cried.

I pondered a little… Perhaps I could keep him with me until he was able to live on by himself, like most of the Piper's Children…

"Would you allow me to be what you would call an adoptive uncle? I might not be the idea you have of a family but I shall do anything in my power to make you happy, Thomas…"

The boy stayed silent for a moment. He did not answer my question, but he did hug me. I owe the boy a lot, it is him who made me rich…

Ahem

Ahem

Author's note: Not yet… not yet, he is not yet Grim Tuesday. Yeah the atlas said "almost immediately after the Breaking of the Will" but immediately for an immortal, it can be a century! I mean, he is not yet greedy. But it will begin soon… ideas are coming… slowly, but they do. Only difference is that I am not that cheered up in writing this one like I was for Monday. Ok, there do was a lot of talking and yes there will be action. Right, basically, it is not meant to be an action story but it attracts peoples so yeah there will be fights and mild violence... though I might be under obligation to make some changes in the rating...


	12. The Grim's Diary Part2

The Grim's Diary

Part II

I was in the Grand Cavern with my Nephew, Thomas. I was again trying to transform Nothing into, well, something new. But I didn't have inspiration at all. I granted Thomas a few crafting tools warning him well that Nothing was quite dangerous and that it consumed everything it touched to Nothing, but he seemed to have far more fun and skill then I at working Nothing. Actually, he wrought a few miniatures dinosaurs and a small roman coliseum and let them fight there, enjoying every battles of his small Nithlings. When one would die, he simply crafted another. I smiled when I looked at him happy. He was something new to my life and I enjoyed it. But there was not only the joy in my existence, and my growing debt all around the House was a part of my duties as well. Perhaps it was my frown or my kicking of the nearest rock into the Lake of Nothing that made my Nephew notice my bad mood, anyway he came near me, leaving his toys behind.

"What is it Uncle Tuesday?" he asked. "You seem to be actually sad."

-"Oh, better not disturb you with that." I replied. As soon I did, a telephone materialized itself near me and rang loudly inside the Grand Cavern, the annoying ringing echoing.

"What is it!" I angrily answered to the one who called me.

-"Sorry Master Tuesday?" it was Noon. "But I have bad news. It appears that a few billing papers disappeared and that they did not have been paid, doing so interests on them accumulated and we now owe 500,000,000 Nobles to the Middle House and the Lower House."

-"What!" I shouted back. "This makes 1,000,000,000 Nobles! How much is it in their currency!"

-"Hum, this actually would be 300,000,000 Gold Roundel for the Lower House and…"

I did not listen to Noon. It confirmed that our services throughout the House were not sufficient for our currency to actually equal the Gold Roundel of the Lower House which had one of the lowest worth in the House. I finally ended this phone call with a "good bye" while Noon was still speaking. The phone disappeared in a rain of yellow sparks. I began to stare emptily at the Nothing Lake, and Thomas soon noticed that.

"What is the problem Uncle? Perhaps I can help…" he said.

"No you can't… we owe money to every domain of the House, a lot of money and I don't know how to pay back those debts and how to have a stable amount of money…"

-"Hang on a second… You say you don't know how to make money?" Thomas answered, and then he looked at the Nothing, then back at me.

-"No I don't know." I said.

-"You can actually make any material goods and you don't know how to make money…"

-"Well…"

-"Well why did you just not make things from Nothing and sell them?"

-"It is because I got no inspiration…"

-"You just need to make copies of existing pieces of arts or things and sell them!"

-"Well, not many persons can afford decorative and ornamentals things…"

-"Start with art, and then you could perhaps get on with something more useful when peoples will be fed up of that."

I thought for a moment and then I smiled brightly… Thomas was definitely what I needed to cheer up my life. For at least five hundred years, I wrought copies of works of art and sold them to the Morrow Days for what I thought would be a fair price. I quickly put an end to the Far Reaches' debts with that, but I soon ran out of Nothing, so I decided with my administration to dig a single shaft into the source of the Lake of Nothing. Then I got more Nothing then I needed personally and I offered employment to those who would want to craft things and sell them all over the House to help the Far Reaches to have a stable banking account. The number of miners and crafters grew a lot so I decided to offer the work of Overseers to the miners who would offer a superior quality of work, as a reward. They were meant to keep order and ensure the work was done correctly. The visor was a special invention of Thomas. You would see the world better with it and orders and instructions would be given through text the Overseer would see in his visor. They had to obey without questions to the orders given by the visor.

At last, the Far Reaches are no longer the poorest domain of the House. The Mine has greatly expended, it is ten time the size it once was and there is ten time more Nothing extracted. All the earth that was being dug away was sent into the Eternal Fields, somewhere well hidden. I got there sometimes with Thomas and we did not want to see that pile of earth. Everyone agreed that I have been very tenacious to make the Far Reaches, that is why, I decided today to be called, Grim Tuesday. Not grim as in sinister, but grim as in someone who doesn't give up. Now that my domain was being richer everyday, I decided to build a few factories where my crafters would keep making the things that were ordered. Dawn didn't seem to like the idea of the factories. She said that we were making enough money to sustain and that more products would be unnecessary. I reminded her that I was the leader here and that if I decided we would sell more, we were going to do that.

Some Morrow Days think my prices are too high. They said that they indeed wanted the exquisite objects I made but that they wouldn't pay that high. How revolting! The exquisite objects I wrought from Nothing have a lot more value then anything anyone might do! However I did agree that they paid with Denizens to work my Pit, as I now called it. It was twenty time the size it had been at the start and it grew bigger everyday. Perhaps it was merely fifteen miles wide. Not that big if you ask me. I was in my office, fixing the billing of the services of the other domains of the House. After all the counting, I checked our banking account papers. We had 234,543,198,480 Nobles, and they now had the highest worth above all others House currency. Now, I had true power, yet it felt incomplete. I needed more, more money. I would expend the Pit and build more factories, and buy more contracts of Denizen from the other parts of the house. I had to make more money, it was essential. My thoughts were cut short as Dawn entered my office. I partly knew why she came but I let her go along, just to see what she had to say.

"Excuse me Master Tuesday?" she asked softly.

-"What is it!" I said brusquely.

-"I wanted to talk to you about something…"

-"Let's get on with it! Time is money and I got none to lose!" I replied.

-"Master its about that I came to talk to you, don't you think we should stop now? We are the richest domain in the House now, yet you seek to get even more money! What happens to you?"

-"Nothing! Nothing happens to me Dawn! I simply now seek to become the most powerful Trustee of all Time!"

-"I can't believe this… Do you really think the gold is actually the greatest power?" she was beginning to sob.

-"It is. It is power! And soon it will be all mine! When the other Morrow Days will owe me so much, I will force them to pay their debts with their domains and Keys, I will be the Architect!" I never thought about that brilliant strategy before but now it was clear to me, with all my money I would buy the House!

-"Please Master…"

-"Master! I shall soon be more then your Master soon! I will be more powerful then Lord Sunday! From now, everyone from the Far Reaches and beyond shall call me Lord Tuesday when they come in my domain!"

-"Master, you already are the richest Morrow Day, you are the richest Denizen! Could you please stop now! There is no need to keep getting richer! Don't you see what you have became!"

-"Let me guess… You believed this fool Monday's Dusk when he says the Trustees have been cursed. But I know who is really cursed. It is you, the Dawn Noon and Dusk. Those of every Day! Monday's Dawn is afflicted by lust, Monday's Noon by vanity, Monday's Dusk by avarice as you are!"

-"No… no…" Now the little fiend was crying, showing me all its weakness!

-"You do not deserve to serve someone like me! Be gone!" and with that I slapped her hard, knocking her away from three meters. She stayed on the ground, and only my kick sent her flying through the door, which I repaired shortly after with my Key. I could hear her cries from the other side as she went away. A few moments later, Thomas entered my office.

"Thomas I'm busy, get out of here." I said.

-"But…"

-"What did you not understand in… GET OUT! YOU ALL SEEM TO WANT ME WASTE MY TIME!" then I suddenly realized I just yelled after my Nephew. He seemed devastated by this. "Oh my what have I done… Excuse me Thomas, excuse me. I am so sorry, really. It was Dawn who put me on the edge, I'm sorry, come over there please." I hugged as he got nearer. I let him cry in my arms for the time it lasted and then I calmly asked to leave me alone.

I would do anything for Thomas, he was something I would not afford to lose.

"I promise you that you will never lack of anything Thomas. I will not fail you, never."


	13. The Grim's Diary Part3

The Grim's Diary

Part III

Rights. They had too many rights, and they always wanted more. All my workers, all of them. They thought that I was actually using my administrative rights to enslave them. Meh! They are under my service and they are until they can pay for the form that I granted them to be transferred to any other part of the House if they wanted to! No other sections of the House have that, and they want more! Damn, as if thousand Noble was a lot! It's not my fault if they all owe me! They wanted more air, they say. They have difficulties to breath down there. I made them pay for that air. They want air do they? Well they just have to pay for it! Its already a privilege to work the Pit and they say there's not enough air for all heh? Then those who breathe too much will pay for it. Now, each day they will have hundred breaths before they are charged for it. The material is faulty they say? If they actually had talent, they would not need top class mining material or else. They just have to deal with it! They are being paid to work, not to complain! I also heard there was a small problem with a "revolution of Denizens who desire to claim their right" and that the Overseers were "encountering problems due to outnumbering". I had to fix them myself. Using the power of the Second Key, I all punished them like they should. A steaming for all of them! A magnificent invention, the steam gun was. Basically, it was Thomas' idea. He actually crafted a rifle, like those used in the Secondary Realms, just to play with it and chase around inoffensive Nithlings. The concept was very simple. A small explosion propelled some kind of projectile which penetrated the target's skin or exterior, causing small physical damages but which caused quite a pain, and because the projectile was hard to extract, the wound was easily infected and caused death most of the time, depending of what part of the body was being hit. I used the same visual design then most of the hand guns but with a twist. Every Overseer would have some kind of steam tank on the back and the gun would fire that steam that would be so pressured that when the gun would fire, a mighty steam blast would rip the flesh off any human, even Denizen's one. Thomas was a genus, though he said he did not exactly want his "ideas" to be exploited like that. He said they were human ideas and that he did no longer wanted to be involved in my creation of material. The boy thought I was doing "bad things" with these concepts and did not like it, even if I was doing all this for him. Yet what he said gave me an idea. If all he made was inventions that already existed and they were human ideas, it meant that Thomas was not the genus, but that his race was…

Dawn, for her part kept contesting my orders. She said the Pit was getting dangerous, that we could create an opening to the Void of Nothing and that the Pit would destroy the entire House and the Secondary Realms, which was a stupid idea. We had reached the Void of Nothing and after much destruction later, I was able to contain the quantity of Nothing that had broken out and pull it back. After all this, I closed that particular shaft and created a buttress of Immaterial bricks and concrete to block it entirely, though the tunnel was very large. That place was now the bottom of the Pit, my beautiful Pit… my lovely Pit… I loved it, loved it loved it loved it loved it loved it loved it loved it loved it…

!a#a!

Another revolution exploded. I finally took a decision… Something that would cripple that FOOL DAWN WHO ALWAYS OPPOSED ME! I SHOULD HAVE KILLED HER LONG AGO! Yet I had a better use for that traitor. I was unsure that my Dusk and Noon would agree, but I had an idea to avoid them to try betraying me. Why would I scheme for them to do what I wanted? Because it would be too easy just to force them to do my will… too easy…

I summoned them to the buttress. Noon and Dusk were the firsts to arrive, clad in their respectively brown and black leather suits. Dawn arrived later in her usual white leather clothes. There how the things happened…

At first, Noon and Dusk stood at my sides, Noon on the left, Dusk on the right. We waited for Dawn until Dusk asked me a question.

"What are we waiting for, Master?" he said.

-"I want you to witness the birth of… seven new servants." I said slowly and calmly after a moment. "You might as well assist me, for I will probably need some… material only you can provide."

-"What kind of material?" asked Noon, eager to serve.

I smiled.

"You shall see soon enough." I said with a slightly happy tone. "_And you might not like it."_ I thought.

A beam of light landed behind us followed by an elevator. Dawn got out. She seemed very calm, though I could feel her anxiety, her fear was obvious.

"You're late." I said frostily. "Noon, Dusk, seize her. Now."

My two loyal servants glanced to each others in confusion, but then Dusk smiled and drew from nowhere a Dark Opal Sword. Noon drew a Lava Ruby Sword in imitation just when Dawn ran back for the elevator. As it reappeared, a gold lightning struck it as I pointed it with my finger, making most of it explode, sending metal pieces at us. We all reacted the same way, raising spherical shields, each a colour proper to us. Black, red, white and gold. The traitor Dawn drew a Snow Diamond Sword, and prepared to fight her brothers.

My two favoured servants charged, one attacking vertically, the other horizontally. The reaction from their foe was logical and effective; she blocked both attacks with a diagonal block. As they all pushed on their blades to gain priority in this fight, I quickly realized that Dawn was more then she seemed to be. Sparks rained from where their blades crossed, illuminating the dark bottom of the Pit. After a small moment, the sparks were followed by an explosion. It was so sudden that even I had been caught by surprise, my Key raising a shield only a small fraction of second too late. I had been hit by the blast, though I mostly had been protected. I felt a great pain upper my eyes, as I reached for my eyebrows, I cried in pain and I quickly looked at my hand, which was covered in blue blood. It was the first time I was being physically harmed, in the very first shaft of my Pit. I had missed a little of the fight, but when I looked bag, Dawn made Dusk fall on the ground because of a low circular kick and she then was about to pierce his chest while he was on the ground. Noon was a few meters away and was running toward Dawn to stop her but his help wasn't necessary as Dusk rolled away and in a rather blurry motion, kicked back at Dawn. She quickly got up and kept parrying and blocking blows from her two brothers, but when she did had the occasion to counter, she always got back priority and even the two of my loyal servants were not able to counter. Dawn's counter attack stopped after a bold move of Noon and Dusk. They moved when they were being attacked, but they struck at her sword to block it, not to try to harm her. They were once again pushing against their foes blade, but that time the explosion was more violent. I shielded in time, but the fighters did not and they were blasted away. They were alive, and their clothes repaired themselves quickly. As this was being done, all fighters pointed their swords toward their opponent/s. Beams of light shot out of the magical blades and the beams generated a very intense white light when they collided. The ball of light was blinding, and dust and some specks of Nothing all went back exactly were they had to.

This was the first Sunburst, as I called it later. An unexplained phenomenon that cleaned up a zone totally, for some unknown reasons. As I recovered my sight, the three combatants were back into a close quarters fight. Finally, Dusk repelled one of Dawn's attacks and succeeds into piercing the traitor's wrist with his blade and the buttress with his sword, Dawn's wrist still impaled by the magical weapon. The sword, like a steel nail, would not budge. The girl's eyes shut tightly as she cried in agony, even more when Noon imitated his brother.

I smiled; they were _all_ exhausted, as I wanted. I snapped my fingers and manacles appeared from the buttress and imprisoned her heels to the huge brick wall. Dawn finally stopped her death cries and was breathing loudly with difficulty, her wrists bleeding blue blood abundantly. I frowned and clapped my hands twice. Manacles also got out from the wall and reached for the wrists and heels of Dusk and Noon.

"Now Noon, you asked what were the material only _you_ could provide, and it is your spirit and body." I said loudly. "You swore to serve me even through the worst! And this is not the worst that could happen to you!"

-"But, Master what are you going to make to us?" said Dusk. He was trying too look like confident, but I felt his fear, the air was filled of it.

I smiled once more, and giant faucet appeared on the buttress. The handle turned a few times and a dark, oily slick of Nothing flowed freely from the Void. Rough Nothing, an infinite quantity, just enough for what I had to do.

"Live well the few next seconds! They shall be the last moment you will be completely yourself! The last moment you will be complete! Any last words, Dawn? You really thought you would win? Hahahahahahahahahaha!"

-"Consumed by greed…" she said. I was first surprised she replied, but it would not last long. "A… a man becomes a monster…" she raised her head so her wet eyes met mines, suddenly destabilizing me. "And… and I shall banish this monster…"

-"… heh… Yeah just try it NOW!" at my last world, the mighty stream of Nothing that had gathered into a huge gobbet, engulfed my three servants.

-"Nooooooooooooo!" cried Noon and Dusk, vainly trying to get free from the manacles. That cry was quickly transformed into a scream of agony, for both of them. Strangely, I did not hear that crying girl, this perturbed me even more… I tried not to think about it.

The river of Nothing kept rushing toward the really big gobbet of Nothing that now was my servants' bodies, and I operated the most quickly I could. It would "fail" if they died in spirit, and I could not have that. The Nothing suddenly shined white, but I had not enough Nothing to merge them, and all the Nothing was quickly dissipating through the air, I was loosing all what I had gathered. I summoned three other faucets, then five others, then ten, then twenty, yet I "needed" more Nothing. It was about to fail. When I had gathered a sphere of at least one mile of diameter, that huge ball of shiny Nothing exploded to reveal one of the most handsome Denizen to ever have existed. His or her details got clearer as the light around him or her dimmed. My creation was wearing an exact copy of my former servants' clothes. It was wearing a leather great coat, leather pantaloons and waistcoats, respectively white, black and brown. I could recognize through it, it because I could not see if it was a woman or man, Dawn Noon and Dusk. Now it was the time to divide it…

Once more, I made all the faucets provide me rivers of Nothing. The same procedure then before, but I needed far more Nothing, and I even summoned hundred others giant faucets to provide other streams of Nothing, and after at least seven hours, the sphere of Nothing exploded in a millions of millions of rainbow sparks.

There were seven figures standing before me. They were all shining one of the seven colour of the rainbow, one red, one orange, one yellow, one green, one blue, one purple and another indigo. The light finally disappeared and I could finally have a clear look on the final result of my experiments. They were seven grotesquely shaped men, each of them, short and broad shouldered with a flattened face. There nose was broken looking and was separating there sunken eyes. One of them was blue, the other green. Also their body's proportions were irregular. Grotesquely shaped, but at least shaped.

"You are no longer Tuesday's Dawn and or Noon and or Dusk! You are now the… hum… let me see… hem perhaps… yeah it's fitting. You are now the Grim's Grotesque! You! You are Tuesday's Yan! You're Tuesday's Tan! You're Tuesday's Tethera! You're Tuesday's Methera! You're Tuesday's Azer! You're Tuesday's Sethera and you're Tuesday's Pit! Got that!" I yelled.

-"Yes sir!" all the Grotesques answered in harmony.

I could recognize a few basic features of Noon and Dusk, but none from Dawn… which was a success. It I had kept her essence without her personality, it was a good riddance.

#1a1#

I quickly realized every Grotesque was living three emotions at the same time, a mix. A part of it was always happy of my good, the other was angry of what bad happened to me, and another feared me. Proofs that I did not annihilate Dawn… but anyway. It is obvious they keep her in check, since it appears that my Grotesques never caused me any problems. I needed them to be my eyes and arm everywhere in the Pit. Since their birth, there never have been any other revolts, which is a good thing.

Now, I rule unchallenged, and soon I will buy the House for Thomas to give it to him…

Boom

Boom

Author's note: Try to describe someone who's mad but through that person's point of view… that person of course don't consider he or she is mad, but try to make it obvious that guy's crazy huh? I don't think I succeed in showing the Grim's madness, but I hope I did because I wanted him to be like: MY PRECIOUS MONEY! See what I mean… Like the guy who's obsessed with something, but to the extreme. Like those guys who are stuck in their room playing computer games, with a pile of junk full of bacterial cultures, with no sexual life, doomed to live this through websites rated 18 years old and , and that never meet other peoples except through Runescape or Counter Strike or World of Warcraft or… anyway. I think you see it? Good.


	14. Haunting Dawn Part1

Haunting Dawn

Part I

Yan was with me, in some corners of the Pit. It appeared that there was a massive Nithling that had to be slain and that no one was able to slay it. Even the three Grotesques in that sector were not able to kill it, that included Yan. The monster looked like an amalgam of various items, hair brushes, mirrors, teddy bears, toys and tools… a kind of Item Golem.

"Yan!" shouted Sethera. "Azer and I will not hold it any longer! There are three Artillery Steam Cannons on the way but I doubt it will do it if our Disgusting Beam doesn't harm it, but perhaps it will dissolve it if you unite your power with ours!"

Yan drew his Crystal Sword and pointed the Nithling, as did Sethera and Azer. Each blade fired a vomit like green beam at the monster. They called that beam the "Disgusting Beam" due to the colour. The deadly ray was inflicting a curious mix of pains. It was burning, freezing and also electrifying. I knew it because one time, a Nithling deflected the vile beam at me, and I felt it at full power because all seven of the Grotesques fired at the same time, and it did hurt me.

"Master! The cannons have arrived and are awaiting command!" shouted Sethera. "They are waiting your signal!"

-"Damn is this! Don't ask me and fire! Fire!" I shouted back in exasperation.

The cannon fired blasts of super heated steam, mostly destroying the Nithling, but as they reloaded, the monster rushed at the cannons and destroyed two of them. The third fired, but was soon buried in an avalanche of multiple objects.

"You incompetent fools, must I do everything for you!" I muttered for myself. I then extended my hands toward the object-creature and a beam of light shot out of my hands. The Nithling was quickly reduced to ashes. A big mirror fell to my feet as the creature quickly died. "You're wasting my time here, doing so, my money. Next time you can't kill a Nithling, get killed by it! It also applies to you, Azer and Sethera. You are one of the Grim's Grotesques; I expected you would be able to handle this situation!"

-"We apologize for this, Master." Said Sethera. "However the other cannons we had were all broken, due of budgetary cut. Now, those are also in that category."

-"Are you fools or what? Can't you repair them!" I replied.

-"We were not ordered doing so. We had to oversee the miners here and…"

-"There are two of you here! One could oversee and the other repair!"

-"Yes but there's too many miners for one of us…"

-"Silence! I no longer want to hear anymore of that! This disturbance shall be noted. For this, you will not be paid today. Both of you. Be gone Azer, and you too Sethera."

Yan approached to my side. He looked at me, waiting for orders.

"Stay there and help those fools here. You, Tan, Methera, Tethera and Pit are much more competent then these idiots there. Also, organize a small cleaning team to get all those scraps out of the way, and try to be nice looking because you awfully look like Dawn…" I said when I looked in the mirror at my feet, and saw his reflection.

-"Hum… yes Master. It will be done, Master." Replied yan.

-"No wait don't move!" I quickly added. I focused a little more and I noticed his reflection was completely normal. "Sorry, I probably hallucinated. That Nothing explosion is still probably affecting me…" I said as I glanced at my own reflection, looking at where my eyebrows should still have been. It was a few years after the Grotesques' creation that a Nothing explosion whipped out me eyebrows from my handsome face. Nothing very serious, only I was less beautiful then I was, which a shame it is.

"Yan, bring the Steam-Car here. We need to move to Third Way Station, Tethera is meant to meet us there. It appears there are some problems, but first, we'll go to the Pyramid construction site."

-"Yes, Master. Right away Master."

As Yan walked away, I broke a piece of the mirror on the ground in front of me, and I positioned it in order for me to see Yan's reflection. I saw Dawn in the mirror, mimicking the exact moves of my Grotesque. He turned his head to look back at me for a second, and the one I thought I had killed several hundred years before did so.

"Surprised huh?" she said, and she kept going away exactly as my servant did. I blinked a three times in quick succession and it was my servant's reflection I was looking at, not Dawn's. I clenched my fist, breaking the mirror.

_I must be tired… Thomas is at the Pyramid construction site, I'll relax with him for the rest of the day… Tethera can deal with whatever he has to deal twith."_

"So the Pyramid, sir?" asked Yan as he came back, driving my Steam-Car.

-"Yes… You will also summon all the Grotesques there, I think there is something I need to check…"

-"I think it will take a while, Master. The Pit is wide and deep, it might take…"

-"No time if they take wings! You'll tell them that when you'll contact them! Now to the Pyramid, now!"

I climbed inside the car and took a seat next Yan, who was the driver. As we got away, we rolled aside a cliff. Down it was a few Nothing Tanks, their top open so the fumes or smoke would not cause explosions. I looked at Yan through the car's mirror. Much to my surprise, I did not see the Grotesque, but once again, Dawn. I was so surprised that when she said: "Boo", I completely lost control over myself and cried out in fear:

"Aaaahhhh!"

Startled, my servant steered "exactly" toward the Nothing Tanks. As the car was falling toward the deadly liquid or gas matter, the world around me quickly slowed down by a lot. I glanced at the Second Key, my work gauntlet, and saw they were glowing. The Key was slowing down the Time for a few moments so I could react faster. I shouted: "Key, grant me flying ability!"

My voice was strangely more ominous and slow, but time was slowed down also. Suddenly, all went back to normal speed. My quick reflexes made me grab Yan's wrist in a fraction of second before he and the car fell into the Nothing, which was beginning to rise to reach my wings. I quickly moved away and dispelled my wings. As I did, the Nothing dropped back into its tank.

"Sorry Master," said Yan. "I should have concentrated more on the road."

-"Yes! YES WHAT WERE YOU DOING DAMNIT!"I shouted back. I knew it was Dawn's fault, but she was partly inside Yan, and the message was mostly addressed to her.

-"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

-"Let it be let it be! I can craft Transfer Plates from the Nothing there. Let me some tine…"

I thought about a huge gobbet of Nothing stopping right in front of me, and it did happen in reality. I thought about the plate and also muttered words for myself.

"A plate of silver with a coin pattern… a Transfer Plate damnit nothing fancy…"

The gobbet grew luminous and two coin shaped plates were in front of me in a flash of light.

"Step in, you know how it works anyway. You can keep the plate." I said hastily. I quickly stepped on my plate, and glanced at Yan's reflection in his, once again I saw Dawn. She seemed upset, probably because she failed to kill me…

Shortly after, I was at the Pyramid. The eastern and northern faces were already built and the western one was almost complete, scaffolds still sitting near it. Six Grotesques were there, playing with Thomas to some game where one person had to touch someone else, then that person had to touch someone else and so on, but of course you had to do your best to not get touched. After a certain amount of time, the one who had to touch someone was loosing. That was why you had to not be touched. As soon he saw me, Thomas rushed toward me and hugged me.

"Uncle Tuesday! I heard your car fell in a Nothing Tank!" the child cried out.

-"Calm down, dear, I'm okay." I said calmly. "Now excuse me a little will you? Grotesques! All in line now!"

My servants were smiling, probably they found that Thomas' game was funny, but as soon I called them, that smile slipped away. Yan did not join the line; he stood beside me, only I did not notice. I turned around and looked at him for a moment; he looked at me, then at the scaffold on the western side, then at me, then at the scaffold and so on until I asked him: "What are you looking at? Join the line now!"

In answer, he drew his sword and fired his Disgusting Beam at the scaffold's base, making it fall _right on me._ The structure was also supporting the uncompleted glass wall of the pyramid, which fell toward me, Thomas and the Grotesques. We all made our wings appear and got away. I looked my nephew flying; I remembered when I first gave him wings. He couldn't get separate of them. Finally, I showed him how to make them shrink in your back when he refused to ever get them off.

The huge glass wall fell on my Tower, the place where I stored loots from the Secondary Realms. Mostly great works of arts, and thousands of thousands tons of gold were stored there. The Treasure Tower, as I called it, wasn't even shaken a little by the very noisy impact, but the whole Far Reaches were. A massive earthquake occurred as the glass loudly cracked and broke on the Tower, which was normal since it was Immaterial Glass.

Some glass went flying to my feet, I looked at it and saw Dawn seven times. She seemed furious. She had the same pose then Yan, her head down looking at her feet only, more like she was very frustrated, not like my servant who seemed quite worried, anxious and sad at the same time.

"YAN! WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU DOING DAMNIT!" I shouted furiously.

-"I… I don't know… Someone in my head told me to fire there…"

-"Fire huh? I SHOULD FIRE YOU YES! BLASSSSTTT!" I was really mad after that incompetent fool! "THAT'S ALL I NEEDED, ONE OF MY SERVANTS GOING MAD! THAT'S IT! EVERYONE IN THE TOWER NOW!"

I walked quickly toward the Tower, and entered the Hall. It was the only place very handsome, after my room, inside here. The rest was a replica of a prison I had visited with Thomas. The Hall was covered by a red carpet. There was a lot of fancy furniture, but it was mostly for Thomas. I did not like that but, anything for him. There was one thing I suddenly hated, the mirrors. The four walls of the piece were mirrors, and as I feared, I was actually looking five times by seven times at Tuesday's Dawn…

"Now that's it! Out! You're all going out! Everyone is forbidden here now except me! And that includes the Pyramid, though you can stay in the Pyramid if you want Thomas, just not the Treasure Tower." I said my voice suddenly softer as I spoke to my nephew.

-"Can Azer stay with me, Uncle Tuesday?"

-"Hem… yeah I spose so, though if you want to always be with him, you'll have to follow him to work sometime, but I guess he'll protect you."

-"Yes sir." Said Azer.

-"Thomas, could you leave me alone with Azer a minute? Everyone else out, now!"

As everyone left, I spoke to Azer one last time.

"Faint but stay up, by the power of the Second Key." I said. The Grotesque fainted but stayed up, he did not fall on the ground. "Stop mimicking him Dawn."

As I said that, she suddenly stopped imitating him and left his position. She moved and even so, his reflection did not come back. I noticed Azer's shadow moved along with Dawn, and that it had her silhouette.

"We meet again."

I quickly noticed a change, she was not uglier, like Noon and Dusk through the Grotesque, she was more handsome and her hairs were undulating.

"Dawn… you survived…"

-"You did not kill me." She said coldly. "And I don't know if I should thank you or hate you for this. I promised I would kill you did I?"

-"Banish a monster does not mean to kill it." I mused. She looked at the door of the staircase, then at the main door of the Hall. Both of them locked, and shut tight so it was almost hermetic, then water poured from the wall.

"But there is no water canalisation!" I shouted to her.

-"Oh… perhaps you should ask one of those stupid Grotesques. They obey every single command I order them…" said Dawn, obviously unaffected by the water on her side.

-"Grrrr damnit. You think you will kill me like this…" I said. I pointed a finger at the door, I focused but it did not explode.

-"Oh the hell! What have you done to my power!" I cried in anger.

-"…Nothing." She said, and she vanished in a grey mist, the reflection of Azer reappearing in the same fashion. He quickly woke up.

"Master, there is water canalisations here?" he asked dumbly.

-"I thought not but there is! Any idea?"

-"We could transform some of the furniture into Nothing and transform them into some kind of oxygen breathing machine, since our human shape need it. I assume if our body dies, we will also."

-"Smart! Very smart!" I quickly proceeded and when the tanks were ready, we quickly put the oxygen mask on our face and waited. I mentally contacted the other Grotesque and Thomas, and after a while, we were out, carried out by a wave of water.

"Uncle Tuesday!"

A few seconds after I was being washed away, Thomas was hugging me once more, even though I was soaked.

"I'm okay, it's all right." I said. Shortly after, I looked at one of my Grotesque's reflection and saw Dawn, staring at me. After five minutes, she made her wings burst out on her back and flew in the reflection of the Far Reaches, to disappear in a cloud of grey smoke. In the wind, I swear I heard her say: "I will be back, and someday, I will succeed to make you suffer so much you'll want to die..."


	15. Haunting Dawn Part2

Haunting Dawn

Part II

The attempts to my life multiplied. It started with two attempts by day, now it was at least eight times each twenty-four hours. No one could explain what happened, some workers were committing fatal mistakes, however they were always fatal for _me_, not for them. Wherever I was, something happened and it was strangely aimed for my death. One time a Nothing pipe leaked all in a sudden, sending squirts of Nothing _straight_ at me. Another day, some Makers made some kind of mistakes in their crafting with Nothing and created a Nithling, just when I passed, and as if it was voluntary, the creature attacked me straight away. One time, I was at the Western Buttress foot and a brick shot out nearly beheading me. Apparently some kind of timed device was placed by a worker to erode the concrete, doing so the Nothing under pressure would make that brick burst out of place. Of course all those who were included in these attempts were severely punished and all sent to the deepest parts of the Pit, but still, I could swear I always felt Tuesday's Dawn somewhere out there. I could feel her energy signature…

Today I had to make a sunburst that would affect the complete Far Reaches, rare thing but I felt in good mood so I decided to do it. Also, Thomas asked me to make the biggest sunburst ever so, how could I refuse. I ordered some fire works as an introduction before the main show, to entertain my nephew. The Grotesques and a few exemplary workers were invited to have a feast and enjoy the festivities with me and Thomas. There was also a steam-cannon demonstration. One of the Overseer was standing before a line of ten cannons each engineered by four other Overseers. As the Overseer before them, the artillery leader, shouted one time, every cannon were raised of forty-five degrees, then the leader shouted once more and the steam-engine were turned on, to charge the shot. Then the leader shouted again and all the cannons fired at once. Then it got on and on for at least twenty synchronized shots. Then, as the lasts blast of steam flied away, the fire work began. Yan, while I and Thomas were looking at the colors in the sky, neared one of the artillery team and told them to aim at the wall. I didn't notice him. Then he gave them some kind of cannonball, which I never used because they had to be crafted. They were only used in the Border Sea. Then, I suddenly turned around as I heard the cannon fire, I first thought it was an accident but I understood it was not only an accident, as I saw a black dot in the blast of steam. It rebounded on the one of the walls of the Far Reaches and flew toward me and missed my head _from a few inches_.

"YAN! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!" I yelled. It was almost a habitude for me to say that now. Some were asking why I kept him in my service, since he seemed to be the source of all those attempts, but it was exactly why I kept him near me, to have him in check. I waited till the firework ended, then I raised both my hands. A ball of bright light, huge as a tree, was standing on them. Usually, sunbursts that didn't explode yet were a lot smaller, small as an apple usually, but that one had to cover the whole Far Reaches. Also the wall between the factories had been dispelled for the event, and we were standing where our "Front Door" stood. The door was still there, but it was not on a wall, it was on its usual patch of land, but the wall separating the Pit and the factories was not there, at least, for today. As I felt the sunburst would affect the whole place, I let it go. It shot out then it exploded into a gigantic ball of light, nearly touching the ceiling. It was very bright, but I had given special glasses to Thomas so he could look at the sunburst, and I could withstand it because of my Key. It was beautiful, the Far Reaches had at least been illuminated by something very close so sunlight. It took whole months before it light out, so the wall was never put again before it was completely gone, which took nearly a year. Probably the happiest year in the Pit and factories because the material was no longer compromised by Nothing pollution and Nothing Rains were gone for a whole year in the Pit, but it was not as if I was going to do that every years. I would make a sunburst at each places of my domain one time per few months. Not as useful, but less time energy burning. I got back in the Treasure Tower using a Transfer Plate. It was useful to use in the higher levels of the Pit, but when you entered the mine, it was dangerous because of such a quantity of Nothing stuck there. The weird energies and emanation from that dark matter had strange effects on magic, living beings and much more…

I was alone in the Tower, though I allowed one Grotesque to be outside in the Pyramid, to play with Thomas. I didn't notice that my nephew was actually staring at Azer's reflection on the glass, but I didn't care. At last the Pyramid was completed, a few months ago. My dear and precious Pyramid, the one protecting my Tower from all that dust and Nothing and soot… I was looking at the glass of the East Wall, that magnificent wall… All its greatness, its beauty… its reflection of Dawn inside it… Its WHAT! I saw her flying upward, to the same height of the floor where I had trapped the Will… Then she disappeared from the wall. I knew what she was up to, so I took the emergency Weirdway I had outside the Pyramid and entered quickly the plain room that was in fact a gateway to a world's sun… But as I entered, I ordered the gateway to close temporally so I was not Transferred to the sun. The room remained plain. I kept wondering where Dawn was and she finally appeared. I extended my hand and it met her cheek. She was real.

"Bad move. Damn you to hell bitch!"

I told her before slapping her hard. The blow made her land hard on the ground. She stood still. As I approached her however, she kicked me hard on the mid section and I landed a few meters away. I got up quickly but she was already on me, with a black sword in hand. I made claws appear out of my gauntlets and I blocked the blow. I transformed the other glove into a dagger and I lunged for her belly, but she raised another black sword to deflect that attack. As I tried to slash her with the dagger, she blocked, and we were stalemated.

"You're pretty reckless." She said.

-"You're pretty stupid. By the power of the Second Key, be gone you scum!"

Nothing happened. I stared at her in surprise and then, she attacked me in a way that both my arms were up when she finished, then she made a circular kick that hit me in the face, making me fall to the ground. I dropped the dagger Key but when I reached for it, a blast of darkness blew my hand off.

"Auggghhh!" I screamed. "Take this!"

I fired a beam of light at her; she merely dodged to the side, as if she was dancing. She then cut off my other hand. Why the Key wasn't protecting me as it should? I soon has the answer. Dawn snickered and spoke to me.

"You fool. I arranged myself so you believed I was about to appear in the physical world, so I did. I made you believe I was stronger then you, so you did. You are reckless. Now open that portal or I shall eliminate you."

I thought for a second. If she wanted to destroy me all that time, why wasn't she doing it now? Perhaps she could harm me in physical ways, but never finish me off.

"No. No I won't." I said scornfully. My pride resulted in me receiving a smack from the flat side of one of Dawn's sword right on my left cheek. "Torturing me will only result in me not doing it. In fact, I'm surprised if you want so much to destroy me that you are not killing me actually. The fact is, perhaps it is because it would only give me the ILLUSION to die… and perhaps this is because you merely are an illusion that you cant kill me…"

-"no… no…" she was saying, her voice suddenly tiny.

I got up, then I continued.

"The fact is, suppose I close my eyes and I try to touch you, what will happen?"

She backed off, but I shut my eyes closed and blindly tried to touch her.

"I am real! You hear me so I'm real you reckless fool!"

I started to sing loudly, and kept marching forward.

"Lalalalalala! Lalalalalala!" When she was cornered and that I didn't hear her anymore, I charged and I crashed in the wall. When I opened my eyes again, my hands were still there, and the dagger Key as still in my grip. I transformed it again into a gauntlet and wore it immediately. "Wow that was weird." I told myself. But then I realized that if someone else inside or near the Pyramid could believe in her presence, she would appear and then she might come back… I needed a guardian, something or someone to protect the Will, not only a hiding place. The Bespoke Sentinels were no good; it was a rip-off merchandise I made to Monday. They were effective but not as much as they would be if whole payment had been made. I kept an "update" in case Monday decided someday to pay for them, which would never happen, as I learned it in the future. No, what I needed was something more powerful then a Morrow Day… Like… why not… the Mariner…

I landed quite abruptly on the deck of a certain boat, which one it is, I care not. The fact is that the Key is indicating this place. While I could not alter the Mariner's record, and not even reach it, I was able to get his location. I knew my chances were slim because as I mentioned earlier, he is equally powerful or stronger then a Trustee, which means I'm supposed to loose that fight even before it ever starts. I was on the deck, so I searched the Mariner by looking around. I obviously knew he was captain of the ship, so I stopped some sailor and asked him who was the captain. He said it was Captain Tom Shevlock or Shelvoque or something like it. As if I actually cared… so I asked the boy where that captain was and he pointed out his quarters. I also looked around, studying the "boat", quickly memorizing its structure so I might copy some to sell to the Border Sea's folks. I entered the cabin and I called out:

"Who is the Captain Tom Shelvocke?" and a man behind some kind of desk answered me.

-"That would be me. Who are you? And what do you want"

The Captain was white haired and clad in some kind of blue coat and tan pantaloon but I seriously doubt he was in uniform. I answered back to his question.

"I am Grim Tuesday, Trustee of the Ultimate Architect of All and Keeper of the Second Key, also Master of the Far Reaches."

-"Ah… since when do my Mother give up her authority over a region of the House?"

-"Since She left leaving that same part of the House under my administration. I don't suppose you would like to work for me?"

-"Nay, I would indeed not want to work for me. I must say, I don't even know what you are doing here but seeing you have a Key with you makes me believe you do not need a license to be in the Secondary Realms…hic"

-"What was that?"

-"What that?"

-"The hic. What else?"

-"Oh… I drank some rum… you see, I shot my beloved Sheeba and I wanted to drown some pain, but you quite revived it."

-"Bah. Don't bother with that, I want you to willingly work for me as my secretary and also protect from intruders some kind of paper of mine."

-"My answer is hic the same then earlier. Nay."

I stared at him, trying to impose him my will.

"You really do not want me to use my administrative powers wouldn't you?"

-"And what are th-hic"

-"By the Power of the Second Key, you will obey every single command I order you until such a time I shall free you from my will!"

Suddenly, golden lightning shot out from my fingers to entangle Tom, but he obviously struggled against the power of my Key. My gauntlets suddenly seemed to become rusty, more old, the gold bands seemed to be peeled away, in brief, they were loosing huge amounts of power and their physical form was reflecting that. The Captain for his part was still struggling against the cage of lightning imprisoning him. Some of his crew tried to get in but were kept at bay by some bolts of golden electricity. Then the Mariner was propelled back by the golden lightning until he hit the wall while I was falling on the ground, exhausted. The Key stopped firing at Tom, but it was not attacking the Mariner, it was just a visual representation of the spell I cast over the Captain, some kind of special effect. I got up as my gauntlets were returning to their perfect looking form, I tried my newly gain authority over the Mariner, I obviously thought I had succeed into doing that.

"Captain! You will come with me and work for me as my secretary and protector of the Part Two of the Will!"

-"As if I was going to obey to you, scurvy dog!"

-"By the Power of the Second Key, obey the order!" I roared back. He straightened and answered calmly:

"Yes, sir."

The crew was obviously surprised their captain obeyed me, but their look widened as I and my new servant disappeared in a flash of light.

"This is it, Dawn." I muttered to myself. "Just try to get the Will that time…"

Author's note: YES there has to be a lot of wrong grammatical stuff or ortograph mistakes but hell, I made a huge effort just to finish the chapter so... how would I say that... I'll check it later. Anything special... just to say its mostly cause of Paladin Dragoon I finished the chapter so I could move on to something else in the story. And I must admit it is now a big fight with Grim Tuesday vs Tuesday's Dawn but I already have some kind of plans for the end so, I should at least finish Tuesday. Then I have a lot of ideas for Wednesday... but Tuesday first... so in brief, I have some blurry plans for 2-3 to 3-3 (this means part 2 chapter 3 to part 3 chapter 3, and an Epilogue.)


	16. Haunting Dawn Part3

Haunting Dawn

Part II

I just realized one thing. My diary existed for five thousand years and still writing it. I mean, I got what, a few pages wrote? Whatever, five thousand years, until this page, passed since the Breaking of the Will. From that point of my life, things get darker, less happy. Perhaps it is because of Thomas, perhaps it is because time is long while confronting Dawn almost everyday, but I came to become one of them who live eternity while thinking as a mortal. The money necessary to buy just one part of the House was huge and I actually had one. I had one on thousand of that money necessary, unless of course the value of the Lower House kept decreasing and their debt increasing… For a few millennia they have been buying Denizens from us. I did not interpose because they ACTUALLY paid for that, strangely all paid commands came from Monday's Dusk department, and some from Dawn's one, but never or almost from Monday's or Monday's Noon's own department. As long as I get profits, if you ask me... Denizen became some kind of merchandise in the Far Reaches, I offered them the peoples who did not yet start to work for a lower price if they bought them in huge quantities. Of course all that stuff was hidden to Thomas, he still had his mortal virtues along with him, he would probably disagree what I was doing, but I was actually buying the House for him, I suppose he will be glad after that.

I climbed up calmly through the many stairs of the Treasure Tower, at that time, it had become an imitation of a prison I visited with Thomas back in his world. It was at the time I thought, despise me disliking it, he might be happier in his own turf, be then he recalled me all his family was dead, then I was like: The Architect damn it… I'm dumb. How could I forget THAT. I kept thinking about things like this concerning my Nephew. I heard they called him in secret the Grim's Nephew. Recently I appeared to get a tad impatient with him, but as I said earlier, things were too slow for my liking… I remember that day I put the little boy to work, in a calm manner of course… He was playing around in one shaft near the surface of the Pit, slowing down the work there. Right at first I didn't care but then I realized that if he contributed to the work, he might earn a little as well the huge gift I would give him after a long, but very long while… So I asked him if he wanted to craft or make things into a special workshop that would he his, and he gladly accepted. I allowed him to make exquisite items or more sophisticated merchandise, anyway he was better then most of the Crafters or Makers. I remember him crafting Architectural weapon or Frozen Moonlight ones, and I really envied him for his creativity, they were most of the time custom models and I would have like to have them in my collection, but I knew this would make him sad his work would not be handed out to those who asked for it, so I always restrained myself from taking some off his stalls while they were cooling down.

I finally reached my destination, the Captain's office. He was very hard to work with at first then I made his office look like a boat cabin and he was already more eager to comply. I entered effortlessly and he was actually behind his desk with the Register of Indentured Workers, my newest creation. In front of him, a simple Denizen. He was having a chat with an Indentured worker. It would not have bothered me THAT much if it wasn't a Denizen was in front of the Register and the prison of the Part Two of the Will at the Same time.

"For the Architect's sake! Captain what the bloody hell are you doing?"

-"I'm having a nice chat with this here Worker. Why so, Master Tuesday?"

-"The Architect damn it he is in front of the Register AND the Will!"

-"The Part Two of the Will? Where?" asked the Denizen, obviously curious now.

-"Now that's it! You asked for that you fool. By the Power of the Second Key, just die!"

There was a flash of light and there was only a golden skeleton left of the Worker.

"That was certainly not needed you slave master."

-"Just shut up already Captain! In the name of Her what did you think about! He could have snatched the Register, ran into the Will's prison, free him and get away-"

-"If he actually knew what they were, you greedy penny pincher, how could he steal something he doesn't know that exist."

-"AS IF I CARED! From now, every Indentured Workers that cross that door are to be slain! Got that? Good."

-"By the way, Master Tuesday." The Captain told me quite coldly. "I had a speech with Dawn, I obviously prevented her to reach the Will, per order 44 but, she wanted to speak to you. As it happens, she is waiting for you in your Nephew's workshop."

-"Architect's sake, when did she pass by, tell me now!"

-"You just killed her messenger." He simply answered.

-"Tell me it's a joke…" and I left the room running like a crazy. I ran to the next room and I immediately got through the Weirdway waiting me there hidden in clock. Instead of letting me slide down, I ran all along the way. Should she merely touch him and I send her to a Realm the most looking like to Hell…

I did not slow down until I reached Thomas' workshop. I even used wings to move quicker above the Pit, there was some kind of troubles with the Transfer Plates these days, but it was riskier then wings, and anyway I had nothing to loose. As I made my way through clouds of smoke or else, I also calmed down Nothing storms or killed Nithlings I gradually formed. The special workshop I made specifically for Thomas looked like from the outside to a stair going down into the ground, one floor lower then ground level. Then there was a door, quite simple. I entered, and as I walked into the bunker-like building, I heard chatter.

"Thanks the Architect he's safe…" I told myself. As I neared him, he was in his workshop, but not with his usual workers. He had a personal team to help him in his greater works. He was standing above an anvil with some kind of unfinished sword, but Tuesday's Dawn stood at his side.

"You! Here! You made your last mistake!" I shouted to her.

-"Surely not." she answered, then she vanished into a burst of black smoke. I stared at Thomas.

"Did she hurt you?"

-"No, Uncle Tuesday, I'm safe. Even if she wanted to she could not hurt me, you told me she was completely ethereal now, isn't she?"

-"Yeah… forgot that one. Hey hang on a second, the Captain told me that she wanted to meet me here… whatever. Well now that I'm here I might as well ask you how it's going, son."

-"Oh very well, I've been working on that sword till she came but I suppose I'll work about it later. Hmmm… can I ask you a question, Uncle Tuesday?

-"Certainly, go ahead, ask. I don't see why I could not answer."

-"Dawn, she told me you could not answer, I obviously thought she was lying, but, what about the worker's condition?"

I stared at him, quite surprised he would ask me something about that. Usually he asked me some kind of tricks to craft exquisite items or failing that, it usually concerned that kind of special Nothing I was trying to create.

"Errr… what do you mean?"

-"Their working conditions, how are they?"

-"You mean their strictures and laws and all that goes with it?"

-"No, I mean, their working environment, and indeed their rights and freedoms. As well their duties and so on."

-"Ehm… well hum… I perhaps have an idea…" I told him as I thought in a way to get out of this tight situation. "Yeah well you could work in one of those many shafts just to see for yourself, don't you agree? So you could see by your own how good their condition is."

-"That's a great idea, Uncle Tuesday!"

Then he hugged me. I felt a bit wrong about lying to him, but his way to think was not to stop me buying the House to him.

"Now if you could take a car with Azer and meet me at the Tower…" I asked to my Nephew.

-"Oh sure thing, though I think it is Sethera who's with me today, Azer had something to do out there somewhere."

He then left me in his workshop, obviously searching Sethera who was supposed to be somewhere in the building or out of it.

"Come out now you traitorous…" I restrained myself to use a vulgar language, but I can tell that the words: bitch, whore and those going around it, would certainly have been said.

-"Traitorous what" Dawn just reappeared into a puff of black smoke.

-"Since when is black your favourite colour? Usually it was white." I said when I noticed she was wearing her usual leather great coat, but it was black instead of white. Her hairs were still long and blonde but as I noticed the first time I met her face to face, they were undulating. She was obviously more beautiful then she once was.

-"Taste changes with the time, I suppose. I wanted to warn you that you will definitely loose Thomas if you keep expending this mine and ignore the working conditions of your workers."

-"It was you! I knew! You try to take him from me!"

-"Before you make me disappear, I think you will like to know I only told him that you were not telling him the entire truth and that you would not answer his question should he ask you about the working conditions inside the Pit. I was right, you did not answer him."

-"He'll work for a while in a shaft just to see…-"

-"The setup you'll have prepared for him. I know you, Grim Tuesday. I can already tell what you will do and what will happen. I offer you the chance to become the man you once were, a Tuesday honest and true, the one Thomas ever loved. "

-"Oh certainly I'm going to believe you who tried how many times to kill me?"

-"As I recall, you once told me that to banish a monster is not to kill him… necessarily."

-"I also recall you said I was consumed by greed, and as I recall, I'm trying to buy the House to Thomas not to myself by my reckoning!"

-"Are you really, or you actually know you are doing it for yourself under the cover of a gift you want to make. Now I got one single question. Would you sacrifice the Key and the Far Reaches, all you were able to acquire just to stay with Thomas?"

-"Silly question, I don't know why I waste my time talking to a ghost!"

-"Answer me. To lose the Key and the Far Reaches or to stay with Thomas?"

-"Hey do I look like I'm kissing those Architect damn it gauntlets?"

-"It might seem to be foolish for you but it is just to test if you really are consumed by greed, you shall see by yourself. Would you lose the Key and the Far Reaches to live happily as you did before with Thomas?"

-"I would certainly sacri…fice… the Key and… my domain for… hem… yeah probably…" I was quite confused at the moment. I would not want to lose Thomas but not the Key either.

-"See what I told you. You are so much going to loose him…" and she disappeared, leaving me behind, thinking about it… If I had to choose between Thomas or the Key and my Domain, which one would I keep?

Author's note: I just realized that if Sir Thursday was being published at March 2006, that meant I was about to run short on books to make chapters, so I will figure a way to increase the time between chapter making/publishing so the fanfiction won't just stop for one year or two. That means that chapters will come out more slowly but its better to wait up to a few months for a single chapter to wait a year or two and forgetting my story just for one Morrow Day's tale... hehehe... Apart of that, I realized I did not yet make Tuesday greedy to the obvious point, then I wondered: How to give a motive to greed? Answer that and I might put it on next chapter...


	17. Consumed by Greed Part1

Consumed by Greed

Part I

I was angry Dawn foresaw what I was doing. She was right; I did prepare a specific shaft where the top class miners would work happily with Thomas, so I might make him believe the miners working conditions were fine. I felt wrong lying to him, but even if I would tell him the truth, I knew he would not believe me. The miners' conditions were not extremely good but they weren't extremely bad… I thought. For my part, I still had problems with Dawn. She kept following me in my own reflection, but never spoke. As if she merely wanted to see me, which of course I didn't want to of course. She wanted to see me, fine, but I don't need to see her also. The Mariner kept doing his job as I wanted him to do, but he exploited so many loopholes I was sending orders by telegraph almost every five minutes or so because he stopped working for some reasons I did not mention or else. Attempts on my life ceased dramatically since my last conversation with Dawn in Thomas' workshop. I also started to trust Yan again, since the one who usually ordered him to act against me without him knowing it was always following me.

Today, I opened Thomas' mining shaft. There was an unusual small celebration and every miner, including Thomas, entered to start digging there and there. I assured that this place was under top security and kept in check by the Second Key itself, should something bad happen. There was an Overseer to keep them in check also, but I had a small conversation with him before he got in.

"You. Come here you Overseer." I ordered him.

-"Yes Lord Tuesday?"

-"Thomas is to be treated as if he was I. Same goes for the Miners. Got that?"

-"It will be done Master."

-"I leave Tuesday's Azer here so he will tell me if you do something wrong." I told him in a manner that says: I'm not joking. Do what I told you.

-"As you wish, Lord Tuesday."

My anxiety reduced, I left because I had work to do in the bottom of the Pit. I had to travel by steam car, which was not exactly comfortable, but I had nothing better. The driver was Yan. I was on a sitting rear seat, looking in a mirror, to face Dawn. I stared at her handsome face, with confusion. I waited that she made the first steps, she always did. Today, she made no exception. She spoke first.

"I'm sad and happy."

-"Explain yourself." I simply replied.

-"I'm sad that I will banish the monster the hard way. But I'm happy because I succeed to cause its imminent doom."

-"I'm alive. Thomas is with me. You made two promises and you fail both. I'm still there and I still enjoy life."

-"Just wait and I can tell you that you will see how well thought is my plan, a giant chain reaction."

-"Certainly… It will fail like all the others." My tone was now cold. "You weakling, since the start you tried to lower me, those times you wanted me to close the Pit. Since that point, your goal was very clear…"

-"I can't blame you… yet. You shall see by yourself at the end…"

And she disappeared, leaving me staring at my own reflection.

"_I just hate her. She wants so badly to be the stronger, which she is not. It is so obvious, she just want to prove to herself that she is better then I."_I thought.

The travel in car was long and slow. For my own entertainment, I slept most of the time. When I thought about the question Dawn asked me the last time, I was now laughing. I would not loose either, so why would I torment myself with choosing between two things that would be mine forever?

After a while, and when I mean while, its like, what, a few months, of car travel, we finally reached the deepest shafts of the Pit. They were near the very bottom of my mine, and I had to make a Sunburst here as well to seal some leak zones. I assumed the warnings for the even had been made so I proceeded immediately at making some light with a Sunburst. That one was made to last longer because I needed some light to work. Instinctively, I extended my hand and placed it horizontally in front of me, a glowing yellow ball the size of an apple appeared above my palm which was pointed to the up. The ball shot high up in the sky and exploded in a huge slowly but not much expending glowing ball. It would last for a minimum of two days, just the time I needed for the work here. I glanced at the malformed miners working here, continually exposed to Nothing. Some had limbs missing, obviously consumed by the matter mined, and that would obviously not re-grow unless I or another Key wielder would heal them, which I was obviously not going to do. They owed me, remember that? Good. They stared at me, almost begging me to free them or else, some had severe facial malformation, like if their skin had molten and leaked down toward the down, they were not something good to see.

"You all get back to work now!"

They obeyed and I moved on to a shaft with Nothing covering the floor, like rain puddles, but an infinite times more dangerous. I placed my hands toward the shaft and flexed out my fingers. A huge concrete block, the exact shape of the tunnel, appeared, blocking it completely. The words: "Sealed by: Grim Tuesday. Cause: Nothing over-concentration. Do not dig less then ten meters away."

I kept doing this for a long time. There was also Nithlings to slay or Nothing to pump out of a tunnel, many problems like it. After a day of work, I received a telegraph. It was from the Overseer in charge of Thomas' shaft. I took and read it.

TO: MASTER

FROM: OVRSEER

MESSAGE:

MASTER,

YOUR NE

PHEW ES

CAPED.

CANT FI

BONUS LINE1: ND HIM!

The Overseer obviously sent a standard telegraph and paid for one bonus line, the 7 boxes from/to and 5lines of 7boxes for message + Bonus line of 7 boxes, commonly called the 7boxes from/to and 5 7message. But what that telegraph was sent for made me feel awfully bad for one instant. Thomas had escaped and they could not find him…

"Yan. We got to go. Now." I said rather coldly.

-"But… we have work to do h-"

-"Now!" I replied, nearly shouting.

I walked quickly to the car but noticed the trunk was open. That was bad. First: Why would Thomas? Secondly: Where would he escape? The answer came by itself, in front of me, talking with miners at the light of the Sunburst, was Thomas. I walked to him and stopped dead in my tracks, the Miner talking with my nephew stared in fear at me, while my nephew kept speaking. The worker's face was relatively intact, but he was hunched forward, his back obviously weakened by the work and Nothing.

"You… get back… TO WORK!" I spoke calmly at first but lost my calm very quickly. "And you boy… we got to talk just NOW!"

The Miner left and Thomas spun around to face me.

"Thomas… what are you doing here. I thought I left you at the top to work that one particular shaft."

-"Is it true, Uncle Tuesday, that they actually pay for the air they breathe? He seemed to have not listened to what I said.

-"Everything has a price, Thomas, now answer the question. What are you doing here?" I said impatience in my voice. He ignored me once more and kept going.

-"That they pay crazy prices for low quality material? That they can't rest? That they are beaten up to work?"

-"Look Thomas-"

-"That they have to pay for their very presence here?" It felt like he was about to cry. "That you lied to me since the start?"

-"Look Thomas, you asked me the conditions of the Reaches Workers, I showed them to you. These are not Reaches Worker, they are debtors. They owe me. They owe me the privilege to work here. They are already lucky enough to have material; the minimum would be to pay. They got to pay back huge debts, time is money, the got none to waste. They can't work properly, they have to be punished for that."

-"I… I can't believe this… Uncle they say that they all have debts, the whole people of the Far Reaches!"

-"There are workers, but more debtors. That's right."

-"But why do you want more? You're the richest person in the Universe, you have your own part of the center of it-"

-"Like six other persons. But we need more, we need what they don't have don't we Thomas?"

-"You got more money then any individual or groups can have altogether! You don't need more!"

-"But Thomas! How can you live without all you could have? You will see, at the end, we will have everything we can imagine to have! We will be at the top of everything conceivable! I just can't wait until it arrives. That's my dream, Thomas, that you and I are the new Architects of All, to own everything and everyone!"

-"… That would be your dream, not mine. I just want to be with you and live as happily as we did before you start digging deeper and deeper in here. I want my Uncle Tuesday back, not Grim Tuesday!"

-"But I am still your Uncle Tuesday…"

-"Uncle Tuesday would have preferred to have me instead of the Second Key. Do you?"

I stayed silent. I could just not answer that. The boy burst out in cries, and ran to the passenger seat of the car.

"Yan, take me up!" he cried up to the Grotesque. He did as ordered as I stared at emptiness, too stunned to do anything. I watched as the steam-car start its long trip up.

I quickly finished the job here and I got inside another steam-car, and then started my own travel back up one day after Thomas. After the long car travel, I was back at the surface, finally. Yan was waiting for me at the front of the Pyramid as I got there by Transfer Plate.

"Bad news sir." He simply told me.

-"Later. Where is Thomas."

-"It's about him, Master. He has been transferred properly to the Lower House. The Day Department there signed properly the paper for his transfer and paid for his record. In brief, the Transfer like the tons of others was made in Monday's name, so there is no turning back. I'm sorry, sir."

-"But… but… I… Thomas… that… can't be… Tell me you're joking right?"

-"Here is the official paper with Monday's Dusk seal. It's a paper from the Lower House Day Department, so it fall under Monday's responsibility, if you are to transfer back your nephew here, you will have to deal with him if he wishes to have Thomas back here. In brief, there is nothing we can do."

-"I surely can discuss that with Mister Monday! Why I can't do anything?"

-"Because to transfer Thomas back, it's Mister Monday who is to contact our sector responsible of transfers. Not you who have to contact theirs."

Feeling extremely wrong, I entered the Pyramid, lifting one of its walls, and then I got inside the Treasure Tower. I sat next to the exit, and I thought about what happened. I lost my nephew, Thomas.

Author: 1 day too earlier. Anyway. Yeah nothing will change my mind, it will be the next chapters in another 20 days. Even now, school didn't really started, at least, for me. I have an idea for the next chapter but not for the last. As for the Epilogue, it's almost done, I just have to writte it, the ideas are already there.


	18. Consumed by Greed Part2

Consumed by Greed

Part II

Since a while I acted exactly as Thomas would not want me to. I knew I shouldn't have hidden that from him, I knew the best thing to do would be to make things right, to admit I was not poor, that it was enough. That the Pit should be closed and filled back in, but I had a strange feeling, even if I had unbelievable amount of possessions and money, I still felt it wasn't enough… I wanted more… It seemed to be for no reason but after a while, I realized that each time I checked the quantity of slaves I had, each time I looked at the quantity of money I had, I couldn't keep saying: "Come on… another numeral on that number…"

That day I had the visit of Monday's Noon who came to talk about the replacement of a few battalions of Commissionaires. I waited for him, at the entry of the Far Reaches, which was temporally renovated into a nice living room, though the window showed the Pit.

The room was tan walled and these walls were covered by book stalls with lot of red, brown and green covers. It was quite fancy with the red carpet on the wood floor. There were two armchairs and a small table with jugs of white and red wine. I sat on one of the armchair and waited. There was no door except for what would be the Reaches' front door, however, when it opened, there was the inside of an enormous and luxuriant hall, Monday's Noon's elevator. I recognized the work I made in that elevator, though most of it was made by Thomas's hand. I felt sad for a moment but by tears never came. In other circumstances, I know I would have cried but I could not _afford_ that. Noon sat on the other armchair and greeted me.

-"Greetings, Lord Tuesday. I came to discuss the fee of the replacement of three Commissionaire Battalions I lost against an army of sprites. We were a little late, so they outnumbered us."

-"Late of a few thousand years, I heard." I replied coldly. "Besides, you are aware that the Noon Department of the Lower House owes me a lot. What do you expect for me to do?"

-"I expect you to put it on our bill, and then we will pay in a few millennia I guess."

-"Certainly!" I said, patronizing. "With all the debts you have all over the House, how do you expect to even pay **one** Commissionaire?"

-"We still have a few credits. Besides, Mister Monday asks, why are your metal soldiers so expensive?" Noon's voice was threatening, but didn't shake me at all. "You simply copy those made by someone before you… we could simply buy the designs, then the Nothing, and never hear of you again."

-"But you don't have the designs." I replied, trying to threaten him. "What if I ask you to pay now? How will you buy those designs even if I did want to sell them? You know I could stop building those soldiers for you." I mused. "You will then run short on troops to organize your mess that is the Lower House and I would be fine with that nice 234,984,271,938,107,890 Gold Nobles I have, but you, you would have to deal with your problems without any troops. I am the one with money, and I am the one who can live by himself, you are not. If I decide to make the price higher, you have nothing to do except deal with it. Besides, consider yourself lucky I do not demand payment now… You still have time to make that money you no longer have. "

Monday's Noon drew his sword from thin air, in response; I made five claws shot out from my gauntlet's finger.

-"Are you trying to intimidate me, Monday's weakling?"

He made his sword vanish and I drew back my claws.

-"Certainly not." He answered coldly.

-"It will be put on your bill, but if you fail to pay…" I waited a minute, to make him think about it. "Now, return to where you belong."

Monday's Noon bowed, and then returned to his elevator, behind the Front Door. I watched it go up, because the Lower House was a higher floor then the Far Reaches.

I thought about Mister Monday and his slothful habits. He was so lazy he could not even realize that he was actually doing nothing. I knew that if he was a mortal, he would be big and fat, like that fool Wednesday would be without her Key. They were both idiots who weren't able to use their power correctly, Wednesday more then the sloth boy. They could have done everything but one is wasting his time while the other EATS. That's futile! They should have followed my example, the way to get power… To get everything you really need: Money. The humans proved that right. The one who have gold have everything. You need some men to do dirty job for you? Give some peoples gold and they'll do it. You need to make some friends? Give random folks gold and they'll like you. With money you can have EVERYTHING.

Except that Thomas proved that wrong. I could not have him with power… And I didn't understand why. I had everything he could dream to have but he didn't want of it. We could have ruled the House together but that's not what he wanted. I was unable to understand how it was possible that he didn't want all the riches I had.

A few days after my encounter with Monday's Noon, I was back at the Pyramid. That time, once more, I tried to create something. That wasn't the first try, and it would probably not be the last. I had a hundred barrels of Nothing, all at my disposition. I started to think of what I wanted to create, a piece of art, a tool, anything that would be entirely new. For the first time of all my life, I finally had an idea. I would make a statue and sculpt it into a human statue representing someone never seen before. I liked the idea, so I pointed my hands toward the barrels and started my creations.

-"A block of gold, really big, ready to be shaped by the Key…"

The Nothing got out of its barrels and formed one gigantic gobet that soon took the form of a giant square of pure gold, after a bright flash of light. I started grip the air as if I was gripping the gold block. The huge mass of gold was being shaped as if it was in my hands, everything I was making at my imaginary block, it happened to the real. I started by the head and worked on it for about two hours. Some Overseers who had their pause came to look, staring through the glass wall of the pyramid. I kept working on my statue. The more I was sculpting, the more there was people staring at it. The statue now had a general human shape, so I started working on the details, like the nose, the eyes.

Now there were perhaps a hundred Denizens that were looking at me, most of them being high in the Reaches' hierarchy. A few Grotesques were there too, looking at my work. The entire crowd thought I was AT LAST doing something original. The face too long to work at, I started to make the legs. Many workers were looking at me, gesturing in the air while the gold block was taking a definite form. I was sculpting the air while the Key sculpted the gold. I was very enthusiast by the fact that I thought I was finally making something new, so enthusiast that I ignored the fact that the crowd was not actually doing something constructive.

A few days passed and the crowd was still there, bigger then the first. There was a pile of telegraphs near me, mail I did not look at while I was working. I was not entirely done; there was still the face I did not finish yet. It took me all the day to finish my work, at the very last.

Then, I turned around to look at the crows, a bright smile in my face. I stared at the crowd, smiling for a moment, and then I realized they were either very surprised or very disappointed. I looked at my statue again and I now saw why they were disappointed.

That statue, the one I had been working for days, which was a lot for a Second Key's work, was an exact copy of, guess who, Thomas, my adoptive nephew.

I fixed the statue, deeply shocked and confused. If it wasn't that I had some dignity, I could swear I would be crying. Not only I could STILL NOT create something, I was missing Thomas so badly that I had unwarily made a statue of him. I got in the Treasure Tower where I unleashed my grief and anger against a Nithling I summoned. I did not notice Tuesday's Dawn reflection in the Nithling's blood staining the ground. But she was staring at me punching on the monster's carcass.

Author's note: Yeah shorter chapter but I got a very, very, VERY nice idea for the next and last one concerning Grim Tuesday. Then there will be the prologue and I got a nice idea about that too… Suffice to say, NOW I am enthusiast about Tuesday's tale…


	19. Consumed by Greed Part3

Consummed by Greed

Part III

Ten thousand years. Precisely. Ten thousand years have passed since I, along with the other Trustees broke the Will. Now things were not really good in the Far Reaches. There were leaks in the West and North Buttress' too often for my liking and no one could explain how. Most of the time I passed in the Pit was at the bottom, repairing cracks and killing Nithlings. My kill count was at 23,429 of them, and that was a lot. Well, not really, but they were pretty big Scouchers and I even got a few Alpha Scouchers, those were bigger and Key's Powers were not really effective on them, since they were mostly made of Nothing and that a Key was not really effective on Nothing except when it was to create things or reduce them to Nothing. Certainly enough, Nithlings, even Alpha Souchers, were not a match for me but they were still tough foes.

I was travelling in my train; my destination was the East Buttress. It appeared there was quite a leak there and I was to fix it. There were reasons I knew and some I didn't, the fact is, there were leaks. I was looking at the outside through the window, the shafts, tunnels and other landscape the Pit could offer. It was pretty dark but the Key allowed me to see well. I remembered that day Thomas left me but I had to keep that in background. Even then, there are things in this diary that are not mentioned. And there are things I officially denied existing, there and then in my existence. But the presence of Thomas in my past, and his absence in my present, was hurting me like a knife in the heart.

The train braked and finally stopped. I went out and traveled by steam car to the foot of the Eastern Buttress. There was, mysteriously, no one in the sector. I wondered why, and soon realized the leaks were critical. There was one quite large gobbet of Nothing that was floating around. As I got nearer, I saw there were streams of Nothing that were feeding that gobbet. And near that, I noticed a few minor Nithlings which I cleared out with light rays from my Key. I approached the Nothing and was about to dispel the gobbet when a blade pierced through my back, coming out from my belly. I winced in pain and looked down to see a blade that looked like a snowy diamond… I identified it as a Snow Diamond Blade. The same blade used by…

-"Tuesday's Dawn." I spat." I didn't know ethereal beings could use more or less physical weapons."

-"That would be because I am not really ethereal anymore." She answered calmly. "By using some of the Nothing that leaked and you know how, I was able to create a temporary shape for myself, so I could win some time…"

-"Why so?" I asked. Almost immediately, I received a telegram from above. I snatched it and learned the Rightful Heir was here… "I see. So you are behind the arrival of that Arthur boy, aren't you?"

-"Not precisely." She drew her blade from my body and stepped back. "I sent Thomas to the Lower House, doing all the procedures to do so, and he worked for Monday's Dusk who then freed the will. Marvellous isn't it? I told you I had a master plan that would break you in all ways you could imagine."

I clenched my fist and blades grew from the finger tips of my gauntlets. I spun around and slashed at the half shaped Tuesday's Dawn, a move she easily dodged by back-flipping. She was partly transparent, and you could see some of the organs of her body, or energies cycling around in it, and there and then, Nothing from the huge gobbet would stick to her to slowly complete her human form. As soon I realized that, I had an idea how to defeat her. I savagely slashed at her continuously and she kept backing off a little, blocking, dodging and parrying. But my offence was overwhelming, she could not strike back. At last, we were a safe distance from the gobbet. I kicked Dawn farther away from it, then I extended my hand toward the mass of Nothing and fired a light ray on it. That didn't have the result I wanted, but the process of regenerating Dawn's body did slow a lot. The gobbet was now unstable, purple lightning racing in and on it, as it took irregular shapes. My traitorous servant looked at that angrily and countered. Mainly made of raw Nothing, my Keys power would not eliminate her immediately and she still held powers from Tuesday. Her assault was quick and very calculated, leaving thin chances of striking back and forcing me into defensive. I did my best to keep blocking then my chance came. Dawn tried to stab my foot and nail it with her sword, but I reacted just in time, raised my foot and stomped on her blade, forcing it on the ground. She still held it but she could not raise it anymore. I stabbed at her with my claws but she ducked and kicked me in the guts. I lost my breath and Dawn was easily able to withdraw her sword and slash back at me. I was able to avoid the move but she kept attacking savagely.

While we were fighting, the gobbet was growing more and more unstable. It still fed Dawn's body but with unbalanced Nothing, and finally, the gobbet was slowly taking shape while we were struggling fiercely. When she was able to, my foe made her wings burst from her back, finally having enough physical essence to use them, though I could see in some parts, the bones of her flying-limbs through transparent places. Dawn flapped her wings and flew high up. I clicked my tongue and wings of mine appeared too. They were entirely gold. I followed her and we kept fighting in the air. With more space to move, we used different attacks and movements, charging, flying around, and sometimes using our wings as weapons… At one time, we were stalemated, pushing against each other's weapon, and feeding our weapons with energy. I was winning at that and she knew it, so she overloaded her own energies and it created an explosion, throwing us off to opposite directions. I was stunned a little and was blasted away by a beam of energy, coming from Dawn's blade. She was pointing her sword at me and charging it to fire again, but I fired too, this time. I was winning again, slowly, but I was. I shifted the angle of my hand to target the gobbet, and I stopped beating my wings to avoid Dawn's deadly rays. Mine hit the mass of Nothing that started to make bubbles. My traitorous servant landed and looked at her gobbet of Nothing, which was now unstable, bubbling and covered by purple lightning. All of that started to intensify, and finally, there was a blinding flash of purple light.

When my sight was back, there was in front of me a kind of grey jelly monster with a neck-less head, two irregular arms that ended with hundred of tendrils and two legs that were more blobs of grey slime then something else. Its eyes and mouth were bright red voids in its jelly form. This, that creature created by an overloading of energy into a great mass of Nothing, was a typical Alpha-Scoucher. I finally spoke when I was done looking at it.

-"Hmph! This will be a piece of cake… By the Power of the Second Key, that the ground under the Alpha-Scoucher turns silv-"

But before I was done incanting, a dozen tendrils cut off the hand I was pointing at the monster, the right hand to be precise. Then the tentacles took it, gauntlet still on, and dragged it along to their master. The Greater Key was shining, as it tried to get back to me, my hand along with it, but the energies in the Scoucher and the Nothing in its essence made it impossible for the Key to get back to me, plus the fact that this Alpha-Scoucher partially had Key's energies in its essence. The monster absorbed the gauntlet and my hand, both of them getting through its belly as if it was water, while the tentacles pushed them in it. At that moment, the Nithling was surrounded by a golden radiance and grew twice its size, which was already considerable.

-"… Great. As disgusting it sounds, I'll have to team with you, Dawn." I said reluctantly. "It's either that or we both die…"

-"Did it really absorb the Greater Key?" asked Dawn, who obviously didn't believe this was happening. "Because if so, that means the blasts you fired at it made it far stronger then it should be… and with a Key, it will be even more…"

-"Anything I don't know you wish to say?" I replied sharply.

Then the monster attacked, slashing at us with many thin, razor sharp tentacles, lunging at us. Dawn flew high up and half of the tentacles followed her in her ascension. I raised a golden shield of energy with the Lesser Key. It did block the multi-attack of the Alpha-Scoucher but its many limbs attacking me started to glow in a golden radiance. They started to whip at my shield which was losing its own luminosity at each blow. It was as if I was using an umbrella to protect myself from nails falling from the sky… it would not hold long…

While I was doing my best to hold on against the Scoucher, the monstrosity was chasing Dawn around. She was somersaulting, spiralling around and yet, the tentacles kept being on her tail. The Denizen spun around and cut off at least a dozen tentacles at the same time but, twenty of them sliced her or thrust through her, apparently, completed form. She winced in pain and backed off. The tentacles were still in her so she sliced them and they fell from her back. Bleeding a lot, Dawn could no longer flap her wings and she fell to the ground with force.

I grunted and backed off to her, the now weakened shield covering her along with me. There were cracks on the golden glowing bubble protecting us, as the protection was failing. Then it literally exploded, the gauntlet in my left hand losing its shiny look. For a time, the Lesser Key looked like an old piece of armour. That meant I had to wait a little before using it again.

-"Just great… I can't pit my Key against its own… you've got any flashy ideas, Dawn?" I asked, angry after the fact I had the Minute Key, not the Hour Key, the one I preferred.

-"Well it's not because I defy death that I will have every flashy idea available here! Use your head, if you can!" she replied scornfully.

Dawn then raised a shield of her own, though it was less powerful then the one I was able to rise with the Lesser key.

-"Will that last one minute?" I yelled.

-"Perhaps…" she answered, still concentrating. "In any case, your Key will recharge sixty times faster then the Greater Key, but I think the Nithling already reloaded…"

Indeed, the Alpha-Scoucher was using the Hour Key once more. He pierced the ground with his tentacles and gold electricity raced across the ground to shock the shield, which broke immediately, as if it was a mere bubble of glass. I and Dawn were blasted back while the monster was withdrawing its tentacles from the ground. Then the thin limbs were thrusting forward to puncture us, but I scratched at them, the Key I wielded taking the form of a clawed gauntlet. I didn't touch them but the dangerous tentacles were being sliced by five invisible blades, and what remained of them that was still linked to the body were quickly but progressively turned to ashes as a flash of light was racing back to the Scoucher through its tentacles. The light reached the Nithling and went out, doing no effect to the creature itself. It looked at his right arm, now inoffensive. The Alpha-Scoucher stared at the missing tentacles and they grew back in a strong golden light, very slowly.

-"Damn! It uses the Greater Key as if it always did… Let's charge, while its concentration is off us!"

Dawn nodded and I summoned the Lesser Keys power to grant me speed, while my temporary ally was flying toward the monster.

-"Key, grant me speed!" I yelled, and in less then a second, I was near the Scoucher. I stabbed at it, with my claws while my winged ally fired deadly rays at the Nithling, who lost its concentration and grew back its arm incorrectly. Instead of tentacles, it had one single curved blade that had a disgusting biological look. The Alpha-Scoucher lost no time and used that new weapon on me, though rather clumsily, not used to such a new arm. I was able to duck and plunge between the Nithling's legs to be in his back, but it used its remaining tentacles to wrap me tightly. Not only I was deeply wounded by the razor sharp tentacles, but I couldn't move without killing myself. I looked at Dawn who cut, in one furious swipe, the last arm of the Scoucher to have tentacles. Now it had only one weapon, and I was free.

She flew high up and I backed off. I couldn't fight in this state, I had to use the Key to heal myself or I would die, but I was vulnerable for that time.

-"Key, grant me my former health!" I grunted, unable to fully speak. But the Nithling was cunning; it rushed for me and raised its bladed arm to strike me down while I couldn't use the Key in a defensive way. But something unexpected happened. I shut my eyes and I felt myself being tackled away, then I heard the slashing of a blade on someone's skin. I felt nothing, perhaps because I was dead… but I soon realized I was alive. I opened my eyes and I saw Dawn, dead beside me, a large vertical cut from her belly to her chin, deep in her throat. She had saved me…

I stood up and gripped her sword. The Nithlings bladed arm was covered by blood, which I identified as Dawn's blood. I stared at the Alpha-Scoucher with raging anger. I charged and the monster readied its blade, which glowed with a golden light. I clenched my teeth and closed my eyes, launching my attack.

There was the sound of a blade cutting flesh. I opened my eyes and looked at myself. I had a deep cut on the belly and I was almost half-cut. I spun around slowly and looked at the Nithling. He was split in two, horizontally. It exploded in golden sparks which reformed my right hand that flew back on my handless wrist. I stared at the dead Tuesday's Dawn, realizing that it was too late for her. Why did she save me? I could not tell. I restored my clothes. The Second Key was united once more and it still couldn't repair them completely.

I would discover later, why Dawn saved me. First of all, if I died, the Key would have stayed in my possession and hardly anyone would have found it. Secondly, well this, I keep that for the end…

Author's comment:The precious help of isntme was... well precious. Great thanks to her, unless that person uses the adress of someone from a feminine person...As for the late... well you should thank the tune Hubris Reprise from Soul Calibur II because it made me writte that chapter when I didn't want to. If ulterior books break my background, like Sir Thursday will with Pravuil, consider everything in that fanfiction as kept secret by characters. And Epilogue will come in a short while.


	20. Better then Wealth

Better then Wealth

EPILOGUE OF TUESDAY'S TALE

Grim Tuesday. The name that was mine before I was defeated by a mere mortal. And now I had to do some kind of paintwork over the Treasure Tower. I felt ashamed. I never wanted to lose the Key, and I did lose it. In a stupid way too, considering of all I was able to. Mountains were no obstacle for me, but mere lack of flair could cause my downfall. I was struggling with a pretty big tin of paint and a proportionally big paint roller. The one I would now serve was behind me. Dame Primus was its name, since it was the Part One and Two of the Will. It was doing some kind of… well… stuff that I did not care of. The only thing I wanted was to simply think of Nothing. I lost everything. I now lived for no reason but do some stupid Lowest Assistant duties. And to make it worse, Tuesday's Dawn appeared to me once more. She was my reflect in the paint in the tin, this time. She did not mimic me, but seemed to pity me. I stared at her before daring speak to her.

-"How. Just tell me how you made this happen." I simply asked. I tried to be cold but I did not manage to be as frosty as I would have liked.

-"Thomas helped Monday's Dusk to free the Part One of the Will who made Arthur Penhaligon the Heir who in turn claimed your Key. That's what."

I sighed. So finally, greed did was my undoing.

-"I did not know how to feel. I still don't, at the moment. I'll have to think about that."

-"Hmmm… did you choose another name? I trust you can no longer be called Grim Tuesday…"

-"Don't bother with that." I replied coldly. "Just call me…. Something I don't know!"

-"Hehehe… what about Uncle Tuessie? Hahaha! Quite fitting!" she replied, obviously amused by the situation. Dawn regained her composure and continued. "Now, I am technically dead. Well… I quite already was but now I'm even more dead. I suppose you would mind that I follow you since I got absolutely nothing to do?"

I thought about it. It did seem pointless to me that she followed me. I did not like her at all… but now that I thought of it, I had no one anymore…

-"Bah. I don't mind. I assume you won't be too much annoying. Now, you'd mind being silent for a while? I got some painting to do…"

I think that girl vanished from the paint, but I knew she was around. That was no really great company but at the point I was, there was not really anyone I could refuse as company. I remembered when I believed in her, the way she could be there. I realized I had to be really alone to want to hang on with Tuesday's Dawn. I started to focus but someone interrupted me…

-"Uncle Tuesday!"

I spun around and to my amazement, I saw…

-"Thomas! Thomas is that you?" I said as I let the paint roller fall on the floor. I rushed to the little boy and hugged him immediately. "Oh my dear! You can't imagine how much I missed you!"

I probably could have cried if it wasn't from some pride I still had, but the boy didn't hold his tears. That didn't help me containing mine, but it felt great to be together once more. It felt great to still have a purpose. Dawn appeared and stood behind us. I did not notice her but she would later admit that she was looking at us with a fleeting smile.

This diary now end. I finally reunited with Thomas. Him and Dawn are now what I live for, searching to get spend as much time with them then I can. My former servant is always with me and Thomas works with me when I need. I can't help but smile when I think I have a guardian angel and a son of a kind. It may not be precisely it, but having this particular family-like entourage feels better then being the wealthiest being of all Universe.

Author's note: You guys are asking me to stop this fanfiction. All writting no review makes me a boring boy. (repeat that sentence about a 100 times to comprehend the feeling of FRIGGIN NO REVIEW! DANG YOU CAN ANONYMOUS REVIEW) By any mean, this fanfiction is now FROST until Sir Thursday arrives. Until then I'll work sparsely on fanfictions. Doing so, the auxiliary infinite episodic project, either Monday's Dawn discovering life or Defenders of the House, will probably not be starting before a while. Expect an update of this chapter sooner or later.


	21. Dawn of the End Part1

Dawn of the End

Part 1

Cold. So cold. That's what they say about me. But ten thousand year is quite a long while. Ten thousand year is enough to forget, but I did not. I remember when the one I loved was with me, when there was no cold. My frosty nature is nothing compared to that cold I hide in the depths of my heart. This would make me even harsher, as some might consider. But I remember that ten thousand years ago, that era where only my attitude was of ice, my heart was melting before the fire of love. I'm Wednesday's Dawn, and I did have a sweetheart. Staring through memories and through my eternal love that pierces through death, I shall tell you the tale of the Border Sea from my eyes.

It started too long ago to interest you. Let's start a few days after the Breaking of the Will, when my heart was filled with tenderness. That was an aspect of my personality I thought that would interfere with my career. Being an executive of a Morrow Day, I could not afford to be emotional. Many underlings said that if I ever plunged into water, it would freeze. Some rumours even said that the sails of the ships I commanded were constantly frozen. Of course, nothing of that was true, but I did try to be less kind as possible with those who worked for me. I'd dare say I was cold. At the time, I was only responsible of the security around the Border Sea. My brothers, Wednesday's Noon and Dusk, were respectively responsible of official salvage and on shore administration, along with their particular department for their respective time of the day. Noon was very young spirited. His short red hairs and green eyes did portray his boyish and fiery attitude. He was always dressed like any peasant would be but everyone respected him, although his underlings did like his playful personality, so they would always work in a smooth ambiance. Dusk had green eyes too, and they did fit well his physic. Always wearing a cape and a cavalier hat with a feather, he was really gentleman looking. His hairs would fall on his shoulders but no further and portraying his function, he was very shadow like.

That very day, a few weeks after my Mistress, Lady Wednesday, became Duchess of the Border Sea, I had a day off and decided to assure personally the security of the ship carrying food from mortal worlds. The Trustee I served was strangely hungry, but kept doing excellent job despite always eating something, preferably light. As long I could please her, I would be alright. However, I could have simply commissioned some ships to escort that one, but Noon and Dusk were on the ship too, taking a day off too. We would have a stop at Mount Last and climb it to enjoy the great sight from above. They said stars were wonderful at night, almost as beautiful then the ones in the Secondary Realms.

-"Well this is not going to be as entertaining then some race around the sea, but it will certainly be entertaining." Exclaimed Noon. "I expect that at least the two of you will have real fun. I suppose while you will be sightseeing, I might as well try to climb up and down Mount Last as fast then possible. Without wings, mind you."

-"Sure, do what you must." I simply answered. "Just don't be too noisy, a part of the charm of the place at night is the sweet silence."

-"I'm not noisy! Depending of what you mean by noisy…" answered Noon with a smirk. "Nah honestly, if you ask, I'll try to not be too noisy."

-"I trust this time you'll stick to your word…" said tranquilly Dusk, kidding with Noon. His voice was not high but always audible, yet only a bit more then a whisper. "Not that it disturbs me but if you say something, you should stick to your word."

-"When did I not do what I said I'd do hmm?" The young man mused, with his eternal smile.

-"I remember a time you said you would jump from the top of the same Mount Last we're going to and that you never did…" I said.

-"Hey! That was because Lady Wednesday expressly didn't want me to do so!" reminded us Noon. Then he laughed and left us alone, probably to find some fun to have elsewhere.

I stared at the sea, in various directions. My eyes did seem warmer when I stared at the deep blue horizon. It was so peaceful. But I frowned when I began to think about the few problems that emerged since the Will was broken. Oh, they were minor problems but still were too numerous, for the few they were, to be a coincidence along with the Breaking. First of all, mysterious ships were sighted. Nothing to worry but apparently, none of them were figuring into a list and they were not Regular Ships, yet, the seamanship of these crews were quite rivalling those composed of Nautical Denizens. I did not notice Dusk who was at my side and by the time I realized his presence, he was staring at me, staring at the way I was focusing on the sea. In his gaze, I could read concern, that kind of attitude any brother would have toward a sibling he loved.

-"What is it, Dawn?" he started. "You seem anxious and quite lost in ponders."

-"That's nothing, Dusk. I was only thinking of the weird recent events. The mysterious ships and all these matters like the emergence of more Nithlings and such like."

-"Hmmmhmmm. And that strange hunger our Mistress is suffering." said my brother, thoughtfully. "I must say, that is indeed worrying… But fear not. All will be well. Let us take full benefit of that climbing of Mount Last, and we shall see what is to be about these less interesting matters."

I simply nodded to that. He was right, at the moment, nothing of that was our concern. In any case, my brothers and I were superior Denizens. There wasn't much in the whole Creation that we couldn't fix, except Days to Days businesses and what was about Nothing, at most.

The journey to Mount Last went smoothly. The rock spire was high in the sky, its 300 feet of height visible from afar. As the ship was a bit slow, Dusk, Noon and I flied to get to the mountain faster. Needless to say we kept a vigilant eye on the food one-boat convoy. As I said earlier, things went uncertain at the Border Sea therefore we couldn't afford to let our guard down. We never know what kind of nasty surprises these mystery ships had in reserve for us, good or bad…;

Noon flew high up and reached the top of Mount Last in a matter of seconds. Dusk and I were flying too, but in a much smoother rhythm. We didn't want to spoil the fun so fast. By the time I got to the top, it was the evening. My red-haired brother wasn't noisy enough to be disturbing, as he promised, so my other brother and I could take full benefit of the magnificent sightseeing location we had the chance to visit. There wasn't much to look down there, but the stars were easily as entertaining then staring at the Front Door down in the Lower House. Of course, it was less addictive, but still pretty beautiful. As he wasn't looking at me, I glanced at Dusk. He was certainly handsome from a mortal point of view, but from mine, he was rather cute. In fact, I began to wonder if he was more then just my brother to me. At that thought, I shook my head and coincidence or not, he turned around to face me. He seemed concerned more then anything else. His voice, even if it was the softest one I ever heard, shattered the silence like a stick crashing on a glass. I suppose I was a bit entranced by the watching of the stars and the ambiance. But what he said was really not what I thought he would say.

-"What's that smell?"

-"Huh… smell?" I looked around until I smelled it too. Smoke. There was a fire somewhere. "Perhaps Noon's doing something a bit flashier then he promised it would be…"

But it wasn't. I spun around because my eccentric brother was on the other face of the mountain, but at the horizon, I soon saw the source of the smoke. We noticed a small flotilla when we neared Mount Last but we didn't pay any attention to it. Now it was prey to a hellish inferno, with a few other ships quickly leaving the site of what was clearly a battle. My trained eye quickly noticed their flags weren't from any Denizen's faction in the Border Sea… or from any factions of the other parts of the House. The last possibility was they were mortals or some fools fancying some piracy, which was unlikely.

-"We'd better get going." I finally said. I was the responsible of the security on the Border Sea, I had no time to waste in theories. I had my duty to attend BEFORE asking questions. Without waiting Dusk's answer, I jumped down the mountain. Half my fall, I spread my golden wings and pulled up a dozen meters above the water. As I got at least half Mount Last's height in altitude, I glided down toward one of the flaming ships. It took me less then a minute before I landed hard, but perfectly, on the deck of the less fire-damaged vessel.

I looked around, not paying attention to my two brothers who landed on the deck too. I merely looked sideways at the sea and a giant wave splashed on the side of the ship, spraying water all over the ship, extinguishing the fires. Any mortals would have thought this was pretty impressing, even House Sorcerers, but for superior Denizens like me and my brothers, this wasn't much more. The crew of the ship dropped their bucket and approached me and my siblings. Some of them bowed, others were too shaken to do something.

-"What happened." I frostily asked. "Isn't this ship meant to be regular? Are you not Nautical Denizens? Better then the mortals your formation is based of?"

-"Actually, my lady, these sailors used a very traitorous technique to… defeat us, I daresay."

-"Speak!" I ordered.

-"We had a fire fight at first. Our Nothing powder guns or muskets were the first weapons that fired. Apparently, these Denizens weren't so though because the fell immediately after being shot, though it may have something to do with the fact our ammos are Nothing laced. Custom made, you understand… In any case, they then fired the cannons and so we did. As the enemy fleet was losing, they used some kind of incendiary bottle of wine and we had to cope with both a firefight and a critical incendiary. And we were outnumbered. We sank six of the nine vessels that assaulted our own three boats. As you can see, one already fell and one would require some help to fight the fire. We didn't suffer any losses or serious harm. Apparently, their ammos and weapons were mortal made and definitely not fired with Nothing powder to deal so little personal damage… though they do dig a hole in ships."

I quickly produced a feather and a writing book, and then I wrote a report. I wrote:

_Report #34541_

_Subject: Attack from unknown faction_

_Location at writing of report: Mount Last sector_

_Importance – 10/10_

_Mysterious ships were spotted near the Mount Last. Their weaponry is inferior but their techniques were sufficient to sink one Regular Ship. The enemy ships weren't from any registered factions of the Border Sea or the House, unless they were but only masquerading under falser flags. _

I stopped writing then I made another book appear. The title was "Entries and exits through the Line of Storms" and I read its last pages. The book was constantly writing the entries and exits through the Line, stating the name of every ship that went through, where they crossed and where they would appear. I frowned and finished my report.

_Attack coincides with crossing of the Line by mortals very recently._

Author's note : Yeah. Yeah I have a preference for Day's Dawn. Even Tuesday's Dawn (who I assumed was a girl and who is more or less my character) who never was described by Garth Nix is among my preferred characters. Monday's Dawn and Wednesday's Dawn too. I did like Monday's Dusk but somehow preferred Monday's Dawn. It's all because they radiate such mysteries or power… I suppose. What's sure is if one of them were to be of my entourage, I'd sure show some interest into them, even if they're perhaps millions years older then me…

About being late… I have one thing to say. I'm sorry… gee that sounds weak for being THAT late…


	22. Dawn of the End Part2

Dawn of the End

Part II

The Wednesday's Pride is not one of the Regular Ships. She is Lady Wednesday's private battle cruiser. A ship like you never saw one. Five masts with four sails on each of them, she was made of an impressive quantity of silver planks of metal crafted by Lady Wednesday herself, with the (expensive) aid of Grim Tuesday. A gold variant of these planks was used for the nails, the masts and all other sorts of detail. On the sails was woven the insignia of the Third Morrow Days, a trident with the shaft and central tooth golden and the two others teeth silver.

The Wednesday's Pride is really a ship hard to miss, and there was nothing bad in that at all because there were none foolish enough to challenge its immense fire power coupled with the Keeper of the Third Key almost always on board.

It was on that ship that I was with Noon. We were to take care of a special delivery from some place in a Secondary Realm back to Port Wednesday where our mistress would be waiting for the cargo. We weren't supposed to know what it was but after a few centuries, it became quite obvious we were simply shipping food. Noon was charged to make sure the acquisition of the food was done properly and in a "legal" way, that is to say, in a way that exploits as many loopholes as possible in order to be safe from prosecution from other Days. Grim Tuesday was particularly good at it. He would make us pay for his silence and every time he'd corner us in such way we would have no other choice. Loopholes were our only protection and we were running out of them. My part was a bit easier since all I had to do was to make sure not bandits, pirate or thieves would threaten the loot or the personnel. Quite easy really since no one dared to do anything to the Wednesday's Pride or its crew, even less if two of the Wednesday's Times (Noon, Dusk or me) were on board.

These special assignments were always going well in a pretty smooth way, but when they were completed, we had to go back to more serious matters. The defences at Port Wednesday were continually reinforced since pirates became to be quite persistent, and even if it was entirely illogical, I could not deploy some Nissers there because that place fell under the authority of Dusk and that some paper that allowed me on intervene there was fouled up or lost because of administration problems in the Lower House. There were indeed strange things happening there… a few years ago, I was asked by Monday's Dusk to clean up some Nithlings for him since every Tuesday's Time were suffering an "indisposition". When I had some free time, I investigated on Grim Tuesday and Mister Monday. One of the most energetic Denizen of all time was simply one of the most sleepy all in a sudden and one of the most pleasant Trustee was probably now had the worst personality ever. Perhaps only Sir Thursday, who was now extremely irritable for some unknown reasons, was more hateable. And there were also Lady Wednesday who actually was HUNGRY which never happens, usually, to Denizens… even less Trustees. I heard there were other strange occurrences in the Middle House, the Upper House and the Incomparable Gardens, but I didn't pay much attention to them. They weren't much my business. I had business with the Far Reaches because everything was "Made in Far Reaches" and the Lower House because they had my Architect damn it paper. More importantly, my Mistress' hunger was concerning but all was well.

All in all, after more or less two thousand years after the Breaking of the Will, the Border Sea was one of the few domains in the House that still ran smoothly despite the "special" assignments.

As the Wednesday's Pride docked, I didn't wait for the gangplank to be set so I could get down. I gracefully jumped on the dock instead. I was in a hurry; I wanted to see Dusk before I had to get back to my duties offshore. As expected, he was nearby. Lady Wednesday's food shipments always were overseen by us. I went quickly but calmly toward him and stood at his side. My brother noticed my rapidly and soon faced me. We were at a polite distance though I seriously wished I could embrace him and perhaps… No… I pushed the thought away and focused.

"Hi Dawn." He quietly said. "I hear the journey went fine, as usual. Did you enjoy the voyage?"

-"You know me. It felt blank as usual…" I replied. I restrained myself from adding _"It felt blank because you weren't there"_ but somehow I knew he must have guessed when I heard his reply.

-"I'll try to be there next time but you know what the procedures are. I take care of the cargo once it reaches Port Wednesday and only Noon and you must be offshore to collect and protect the food." He sounded like he was sorry but, sadly, not enough for me. But as he smiled, I quickly forgot that. "Say, do you have some free time tonight? Perhaps we could have diner somewhere quiet this night? As I listed every restaurant of the Border Sea, one of them seemed pretty good. You would want to give it a try with me?"

I later understood he was genuinely casual, that he merely felt it would be good for me to take a break. Nothing else. But at the time, it meant much more to me… I would discover, too late, that unfortunately, that didn't mean as much to him then to me. As I only smiled at his invitation, he said:

"I take it as a yes. Words are that you have to patrol some water that borders the Realms. I just hope the time is not too chaotic. I'd hate to wait months for you before trying that place's cuisine."

Then he simply left me as I could not erase that smile from my face. I was back to reality really fast as a Nisser Official called me. We indeed had to patrol the Line of Storm where it bordered the Secondary Realms far more then usual so Time would probably meander. I could be back either a year or an hour later in the House. I hoped it would be an hour.

But fate is cruel sometimes. However, this time it was crueller then usual. I would be back in an hour but not the way I wished. The patrol went fine. Nothing unusual to report, the Line even was easier to navigate through then usual… But obviously that could not last. For more or less two thousand years, we got problems with pirates, and not any pirates, mortal pirates. We kept them in check pretty easily, they were easily captured or defeated in open sea battles against me and my Nissers, but that was the point. They almost never fought in open sea battles, preferring sneaky and treacherous battle tactics and strategies, making them difficult to neutralize or eliminate. The word of order concerning them was: kill on sight. Piracy decreased a lot since these orders were given to every Nisser. The guards of the Border Sea could fight excellently on the surface or under water, advantage of their scales and fins. All in all, they were literally fishy men.

So technically, there was nothing unfortunate when pirate ships were spotted during that patrol. But that quickly changed. First of all, there was the smell of Nothing Sorcery in the air. Second thing, we spotted them when they were far too near for us to react quickly… And it wasn't even a Nisser who spotted them, it was I. No one could see the ships apart from me until I cast a weak spell weakly mimicking a Sunburst. The energies cast away the spell of invisibility and revealed the enemy.

We had about five ships and perhaps a hundred Nissers on each of them. After the barrage of grape shots and solid shots, that was reduced to two ships and about eighty-six Nissers. I wondered how these shots could have slain and destroyed more then half my effective in less then a minute but the answer quickly came to me as I realized there were few or no remnants of the destroyed ship. That meant they had been dissolved and returned to Nothing by heavily Nothing stained ammunition. I always wondered how the pirates were able to fire these without any backfire from the Nothing.

After my short damage report, I immediately ordered a counter attack. We fired our own volley and sunk three ships of the twenty the pirates had. I summoned and threw my Sun Light Harpoon on the biggest ship of the enemy. The result seemed to be impressive for the mortals, but to me, it was merely satisfying. The harpoon dug an enormous hole in the hull of my target and the infernal heat soon started to burn the wood. The weapon, still nailed down somewhere in the ship attracted some lightning from the Line of Storms. That destroyed much of the ship, and combined with the initial attack, gave quite a show to my sailors and quite a warning to our foes.

I could have ordered to continue the fight but I knew something was not right. A very good sorcerer must have crafted the grape shots and the solid shots because they were filled of Nothing and that it went back to the Void straight away, it didn't linger on the hit zone. In short, that meant that if I was assured I could take out the whole fleet alone, I didn't want the Nissers to meet their doom. Perhaps I am cold but I secretly care for the others. In any case, I ordered the retreat immediately and covered the ships in gold protective spheres of energy. I summoned my wings then flew high up. I used my powers to freeze the water beneath the enemy ships so they could no longer progress. The ice would hold as long as I wished but my energies had their limits and I let the freezing spell go as the Nisser guard boats were out of the Line of Storm, back somewhere hopefully safe in the Border Sea. They could be pursued but I made sure it didn't happen. I summoned back my Sun Light Harpoon and made it shine very brightly. Even through the constant storm, anyone who wasn't blind could have seen me. I raised an energy shield around me to protect myself from lightning or any sorcery that might be used against my person. I thought the sorcerer might show himself and confront me. Failing that, I would simply destroy the pirate ships and be on my way.

Only the first part of my plan appeared to be true. A very particular pirate emerged from one of the ship's cabin. He wasn't ugly but wasn't handsome either. He had black hairs and strange green eyes. His dress was a red tailed coat and white trousers. The pirate also sported a typical black pirate hat with a skull emblem in the center of it. But what amazed me was the fact he also wore wings. Standard white wings but still… I didn't expect mortals to wear wings. The pirate, who I guessed must be the pirate sorcerer, flew close to me but out of reach from my Harpoon. He spoke first. His voice was one of a rude human male… all in all, the kind of voice fitting an official of the Great Maze… or a brutish pirate.

-"I am Captain Elishar Feverfew… and if my… temporary immediate superiors' information are right, you must be Wednesday's Dawn. Am I right?"

-"I am more then that, pirate. Sorcerer or not, you are no match for me. I am also your death, sorcerer."

I suppose that ended the presentations. I thought of destroying the pirate ships but Feverfew was protecting them like I did probably with the aid of Nothing based spells. Obviously, I made the first move. I was in no mood to allow any counter attack and I was sure that pirate Sorcerer was an amateur, not a fully trained Nothing Sorcerer, which he proved to be though where he learned all this was a unknown information to me.

I pointed my Sun Light Harpoon in his direction and fired a yellow ray of light that would normally burned to ashes anything it touched, but it never landed on Feverfew. Instead, a sort of dense black smoke absorbed my light based beam attack. The pirate counter attacked by drawing a paper with a spell written on it and throwing it, aiming for my heart. At the center of its arc, a red lightning bolt shot from the spell and flew directly to Feverfew's mark, but I raised my golden protective energy sphere around me just in time. The bolt ricocheted away and did no harm to me or my foe. We kept exchanging magical attacks from sprays of energy shrapnel to super concentrated shadow balls. In that fight, Feverfew didn't even seem to represent darkness, he represented Nothing. And I was light fighting the Void…

We quickly came to the conclusion we could not undo each other with magic, much to my surprise. My magic skills were either decreasing or this pirate was quite an elite sorcerer. In any case, we adopted fighting stances as magic would not avail us. Again, I made the first move. I once had some combat training sessions with Monday's Dawn and Tuesday's Dawn. If the latter was far better at melee fighting then the first and I united, I sure was better then Monday's Dawn and she was certainly better then this pretentious Feverfew. This in mind, I didn't waste time gauging my prey's skills with basic attacks. I wanted victory and I wanted it now so I immediately started a complex combo with my Sun Light Harpoon, mixing speed and strength, moderate accuracy but extreme complexity, making many feints and targeting numerous body zones to make it difficult to predict where I would strike but more importantly, where I would not strike. It took no time for me to defeat the pretentious Feverfew, he could not keep up. Many hits landed and the pirate, who I knew was a mortal, should actually be dead… but he merely seemed exhausted. Not dead but at least neutralized for a while. He was seriously in a bad state, many deep cuts covered his body and his clothes were severely damaged but not yet rags.

-"… It… seems… that you beat me today, Wednesday's Dawn… but next time-"

-"There won't be any next time." I coldly interrupted him. Then I thrust my Harpoon in his chest. The impact propelled him to the deck of one of his ship and nailed him to it. He stopped moving and I assumed he was dead. I made my weapon disappear from Feverfew's body and transformed myself into a golden shark, my typical nautical travel form. I then plunged headfirst in the water and crossed the Line into waters that, I hoped, would be part of the quickest itinerary back to Port Wednesday.

Fortunately, it took me about three hours as Time pass in the house to get back to Port Wednesday. To my surprise, it seemed that Noon and Dusk were already waiting for me. I shot out of the water, transformed back to my human shape and landed near my brothers. They had a surprised look as they stared at me. I looked at myself through a mirror I produced from thin air and understood why they were looking at me that way. My white naval officer ensemble was stained with read blood and my hair cut was ruined. I frowned and ignored their look. It was true I was usually more caring then my brothers when it concerned my appearance but we just had no time.

-"Bad news. The pirates got sorcerers or at least, a particularly talented one. He's not much of a fighter but even my magic was not enough to dispatch him. If he's dead or incapacitated, I do not know, but we should take action quickly and hunt down any pirate activity throughout the Border Sea."

-"We got no time for that sis. I and Dusk just received direct orders from Lady Wednesday." Said Noon. "She left with the Wednesday's Pride because she was summoned to a secret location of the Sea by the other Morrow Days. We don't know what it's all about but we were directly ordered to stay behind protect the Port from any pirate attack during her absence. This includes you, Dawn. The paper that allowed you to act here has been found with the help of Monday's Dusk. Lady Wednesday is right to think these pirate things will get worse while she will be busy, and the fact that you crossed blades with a pirate sorcerer makes it evident the Port is at risk."

-"I seriously doubt they got any other sorcerers! I suspect the only they got is the one I just beat this afternoon!" I scoffed. "Besides, our best defence is attack so we'd better-"

-"I'm sorry Dawn," Interrupted Dusk. "But direct orders cannot be challenged. All arms are to stay and defend Port Wednesday from pirate attacks. Based on the reports of your Nisser who arrived a bit earlier then you and the reports of your scouts all around the Border Sea, the pirates are massing and it seems obvious their target is Port Wednesday. They probably had words of Lady Wednesday's absence and it is why we are tasked to fend them off. Any questions?"

-"… can we still go to that restaurant?"

Author's note: Sorry for the big delay but I had absolutely no inspiration and I decided it was better that I write nothing instead of writing something crappy. About my grammar and my errors, I'm sorry guys. English is not my first language, French is though I don't live in France and my English course is CRAP! They teach us nothing useful and we got to do the job ourselves, yet we pay for that piece of shit! Anyway… I'm glad that despite my very ordinary writing skills, you liked the story overall. I'm going to buy the "Little Brown Handbook" so perhaps this will help. With this, enjoy the chapter.

P.S. I'll proof read the thing later. Just writing it took me a lot of effort so be kind, thanks.


	23. Dawn of the End Part3

Author's comment: Late. Hot of the press content. Lots of errors. Excess of laziness. Next chapter prolly when Superior Saturday comes out (I need the Upper House layout don't I?) Now about the errors, French is my first language, English the second. If you notice errors, please tell me what kind of errors are the most frequent like syntax, verb tense, and if possible, how I can fix that. Failing that, a simple review is welcome! And really I'm sorry that I didn't update in like... a year? And I probably won't update till March so P I know, using scenario to be lazy and no update is evil. Really really evil. But I like evil See ya, and enjoy!

Dawn of the End

Part III

"Night brings counsel" they say. But this time, I could not say so. Despite all that was to be done, I slept, last night. And it was not counsel that I got, but confusion. Sleep brought more chaos then it brought order in my mind, my dreams were filled of unchecked emotions intertwined into a volatile mix which was either sorrow or hate, probably something in between. It was not always a happy thing to master the mortal art to dream. It means nightmares as much as it meant dreams. I did not wake up in my bed in my cabin, onboard of the Wednesdays' Pride. I was actually lying on a bench, somewhere in Port Wednesday, facing the sea. There was a lot of activity around me. Nissers were boarding their ships, down below. Port Guards of the Evening were mounting barricades, carrying Nothing powder to remote strategic positions, busy transforming the Port into a temporary fortress. I got up and looked around. As I looked around, I wondered what the hell was happening. What was the big hurry? Then I remembered. Or should I say, someone reminded me of what was the big hurry, and with that, I soon forgot of that strange maelstrom raging in my mind.

-"Milady Dawn."

Startled, I spun around to face the Nisser who just had spoke to me.

-"I'm sorry ma'am. I didn't want to startle you. Seeing as you were actually busy with some… important matters… we took the initiative to prepare the fleet for the imminent pirate attack without waiting for you. Do you see any inconvenient in that?"

-"Of course not," I replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the House. "What's the situation in the Port?"

-"Sir Dusk had his port guards mount cannon walls in the higher levels in order to protect all the goods Sir Noon had moved there. Cannons were also moved from merchant ships to the levels a little bit bellow."

-"How come? I thought cannons were to be put in the lower levels. Why this sudden drastic change?" I said, not happy the defence strategy was changed so drastically without me being consulted. Usually, my brothers were consulting me for matters of this kind.

-"I suggest you see for yourself, please look down bellow."

I looked then I realised something. I was actually in one of the higher levels of the port, but it seemed the docks were only a few levels away while they should actually be at least a dozen floors away. Then I realized the truth. The docks were missing. The boats were here, but where were the docks?

-"Where are the docks?" I said, as if accusing the Nisser at my sides from hiding them.

-"They are thirteen levels below us… and ten levels below the sea."

-"What?"

-"The overall level of the see rose of twenty-one fathoms, of ten fathoms earlier in the night and of eleven fathoms about an hour earlier. We can't tell the origin of the problem but we believe the second rising has something to do with a misdirection of the governing power of the Border Sea."

-"Hmmm… Tell the officer who took in charge the organisation of the defence of the Port's waters that he's officially in charge now. Dismiss!"

Misdirection of the power governing the Border Sea, he said. That meant the Third Key, for sure. That meant Lady Wednesday had problems otherwise there would've been no problems with the Sea, at least, not problems of such a high scale. And holding an object of power as powerful as the Third Key, there was possibly nothing strong enough or potent with magic to possibly cause much problem to my Mistress within the Border Sea. Unless…

-"That horrible pirate!" I spun around and called back the Nisser I just ordered to dismiss. Then I shouted a series of order in quick succession, which my confused subordinate rapidly noted in a small handbook. "Override every standing order! All hands to their respective ships! Regular ships behind, guard boats and the Nisser Enforcing Fleet ready for immediate depart! All ships must be armed and ready for battle in exactly fifteen minutes!"

-"Yes ma'am, all ships available under your department must be armed and prepared to leave in fifteen minutes. Regular Ships stay at Port."

As the Nisser Officer left, I deployed my golden wings which just appeared and flew high up to have a view of the area. There was no ship in sight in the horizon, except those stationed at Port Wednesday bellow me. As I kept watching the horizon, I did not notice two figures flying straight up to me. One had silver wings and the others' were black.

-"Hey sis!" boomed an upset voice behind me. "What's the matter with the big changes of plans? I don't think you have the rank and power to override standing orders from Lady Wednesday in any case don't you? Down bellow, it looks like you're going for an assault mission or something quite flashy. What in the Architect's name are you up to?"

-"What Noon means to say," continued a calmer voice, probably Dusk's voice. "Is that we were specifically ordered to defend the port and that somehow, we doubt having you at Sea with all the Nissers will really help us fend off the pirates which, I gather, are charging straight on us."

-"For the Architect's sake don't you understand?" I angrily replied. I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself. My brothers were the only ones I would never allow myself to lose my nerves on… along with Lady Wednesday. Little did I know she could no longer care since… one hour ago? "Why would the Sea raise that much except from some kind of problems with the Third Key? And don't tell me someone lost twenty million tons concrete out there in the Secondary Realms! If there are problems with the Key, there are problems with Lady Wednesday and what can possibly cause problems to Lady Wednesday in her own demesne?

-"Hmmm…. I don't know. No, I seriously don't know." Replied Noon, confused.

-"I must admit I do not know." Added Dusk.

-"Pirates! What else! I told you yesterday I was pitted against a Pirate Nothing Sorcerer of the same caliber as one of us! They probably got many of them and overwhelmed Lady Wednesday! The raisings of the Sea level is probably some misdirection of the Key's power when she was fighting them! That means one hour ago, she was still fighting and probably needs our help! Now you can either stick here and wait for the pirates to attack us and make sure Lady Wednesday's dead or attack now and take what little chance our Mistress is alive!"

I looked down at the Port and smiled slightly as I saw all my ships were ready. I nodded at my brothers then glided down, aiming for a ship at random, then curved up my descent and landed softly on the ship's deck. All the men onboard swiftly stood at attention. I waved my hand to have them go back to work, and quickly gave them sailing orders. Soon, we were on the move, and our destination was that secret meeting place.

-"Hang on, sister. Do you know where the Wednesday's Pride is?" Said Noon, who had just landed near me as he understood where I was planning to go. "It's at a SECRET meeting place, how can you know where it is if it's secret?"

-"Come on, Noon." I replied, exasperated. "Since the Morrow Days are what they are, there are hardly any secrets that are truly secret. Information leaks everywhere in the House except in upper floors like the Great Maze or the Upper House or the Gardens, for that matter. Everywhere else, information is free for everyone if you have the power for it. I learned the meeting place by Monday's Noon, he probably leaked the information from Mister Monday himself as it happens, and I would not be surprised by that. Now enough loitering, are the two of you coming?"

They nodded and we were off. The journey was awfully long; furthermore, we were sailing through the Realms a Saturday. Not only there were risks we'd get intercepted by Internal Auditors, there was also Grim Tuesday who would certainly like to charge us for his silence. He certainly knew about that journey, as I told my brother, information was easily accessible for anyone who has the power for it, and Grim Tuesday certainly had that. Little did I know it was the least of my concerns.

After a few agonizing hours, we were finally here. And even an idiot would have understood, judging from the scene that was offered to us, that we were too late. A dozen pirate ships circled around the Wednesday's Pride, and on the gold and silver ship, on the main mast, stood proudly… Feverfew. He was alone. And even from the distance, it was obvious he was grinning. Lady Wednesday had fought and clearly had been defeated, though I did not understand how he alone could defeat her in her own demesne. She had a Key, the Third Key, and in its own domain, it was paramount to virtually every other power!

Wings burst out from Feverfew's back and he flew high up, then glided down to hover over my ship. The rest of my fleet of Nissers was behind me. We would certainly destroy the pirates with ease, but not if their Sorcerer destroyed us first.

-"Feverfew!" I called anger in my voice. "Where is my Mistress?"

He ignored me.

-"Ah… Wednesday's Dawn. I see you brought company, your brothers came to your aid." He replied, his voice ridiculously soft compared to the last time. His refusal to answer my question made me even angrier. "Wednesday's Noon, and Dusk. I fear, Noon is no one to stop me, and I will take pleasure into reducing Dusk into dust."

-"QUIT PLAYING WITH WORDS AND TELL ME WHERE MY MISTRESS IS!" I shrieked back.

-"Such impatience deserves punishment. I will have countless times to bring you down, Miss Dawn. Where is your dear Lady Wednesday? I'll tell you where she is. No even better… I'll… I shall lead her to you."

Feverfew drew a paper from his coat, which was neater then it used to be, and he threw it in our direction. Unsurprisingly, the post-it flew straight at us and landed right at my feet. Then there was that smell in the air… that smell of roasted meat with sauce. I grabbed the paper and examined it. It was of magical nature, but whatever it meant didn't answer my question.

-"Your petty smelly paper doesn't answer my question. I shall ask one last time before-"

The Sea suddenly become agitated, our ships began to rock dangerously. Then it stopped and the waters went calmer a bit, but they were agitated once again, and a lot more, all in a sudden. And we saw that it was caused by a fish or rather, an enormous something that was swimming under us.

-"What's that?" Asked Noon, but from that second, I knew he wasn't referring to the gigantic "thing" that was swimming under us, but to a strange noise in the air. It seemed like the chant of a whale, but there was something that was addressed to us specifically in that chant, for no one else but my brothers and I heard it in that chant.

"Saturdaysaturdaysaturdaysaturdaysaturday!" it said.

-"Saturday?" I whispered. What was about Saturday? I did not linger on that thought for long, however, for Feverfew spoke again.

-"You wanted to see your good Wednesday. And there she is."

Giant waves. Feverfew sinking the Wednesday's Pride with a single power bolt. And that impossibly huge white mountain, a thousand miles away, but that seemed so near because of its size. And all the Nissers here, and my brothers, waiting to be killed by it because my rashness lured us all into this deadly trap, and Feverfew who flew high up, dispelled the illusion of the pirate ships that we noticed earlier, and he would also make sure no one would make it out.

-"No way."

That was my only answer to this impossibly cruel scenario. I grasped the air and my Sun Light Harpoon materialized, then, in a click of my fingers, my own golden wings burst out and I flew high up to confront the damned Pirate Sorcerer. My brothers followed me and tried prevent me, but I wrestled them off, and kept flying. At the moment, I did not know my blind rage would lead to their death.

The first surprise was to see Feverfew was still grinning... in a sinister way. The next surprise was to see his finger, pointed straight at me. A finger burning with a sorcerous Nothing-based flame, then that same kind of flame appeared on my harpoon, and it exploded in my hand. As a reflex, I buffeted the shards away, but the next moment, all I knew is a great tentacle of water was holding me in place. I knew it was Feverfew's doing. The Sorcerer flew near me, still grinning.

-"It will be a pleasure for me to bring you down, Miss- aaaargh!"

It happened so quickly. All in a sudden, the pirate sorcerer was propelled away by a well thrown Architectural Harpoon, and a Frozen Moonlight Harpoon, equally well thrown, dispelled the tentacle that was holding me. I quickly grabbed the weapon as the limb of water unravelled, and I watched as Wednesday's Noon was going one on one against Feverfew.

He was quickly repelled.

-"I thought I would give you death, Wednesday's Dawn!" Shouted Fevefew, as red sizzling blood was flowing abundantly from the right of his chest. "But I will rather give you sorrow."

Another tentacle of water, but this one did not go after me, it rather grabbed my brothers, and quickly pushed them away. Then Feverfew glided towards me, definitely going to try and kill me, but he never made it. That same Architectural Harpoon, Noon's weapon, flew once more as he was dragged away by a gigantic rope of water, and pierced my enemy, in the chest this time. I took the opportunity, grasped the weapon and thrust it out of the Nothing Sorcerer's body, and using both the black tipped spear of Frozen Moonlight and the red tipped one of Architectural Fire, slashed Feverfew away in a cross attack.

And there was that titanic mass of white that was still swimming at an amazing speed right at us. That most gigantic white whale: Drowned Wednesday.

With the only enemy in presence crippled, (or so his barely-floating-in-the-water crouching would attest) I quickly tried to fly to my brothers. I saw them exchange glance, then all I knew is I knocked out. Or was I?

"Saturdaysaturdaysaturdaysaturdaysaturdaysaturdaysaturday"

SATURDAY

-"Saturday, Milady Dawn? Today is Monday. You were unconscious for exactly a week and two days."

That voice. My second in command's voice, the Nisser who answers only to me.

-"What happened?" I whispered.

-"We left Port Wednesday and found the now sunk Wednesday's Pride. You fought with the pirate sorcerer Feverfew and barely escaped death yourself. The vile pirate set Drowned Wednesday on us and we just managed to sail away a few miles from Wednesday's path."

-"Where are my brothers?" I asked. My voice was still fairly weak. What happened? I was flying to save Noon and Dusk and… then…

-"I fear… Feverfew had them in his grasp and… he…"

Two little words… so hard to pronounce them…

-"Killed them. He killed them." I finally managed to say it. But I couldn't believe it. I wanted to cry, I wanted to die, but I couldn't. I wouldn't. Clumsily, I got up. My dress, reacting to my feelings, transformed into a simple black dress. Black, the color of grief and sorrow and mourning. I wore that.

-"What shall we do, Milady Dawn?"

-"Rather what will "I" do. I'm going to the Upper House."

-"The Upper House? Why?"

-"What happened to Lady Wednesday has something to do with Saturday. I don't know what, but it has something to do with her."

-"And what are you going to do, madam?"

-"I'm going to kill Superior Saturday, what else."


	24. Wednesday's Sentence extra

Extra Chapter 1

Extra Chapter 1

Morrow Days Tale

Wednesday's Sentence

The three who were present were feeling uneasy with each other at best. Normally they should have been six, but two of them would not come, each for their respective obvious reasons known by all the others, but unspoken in a sort of tense, thin and fragile respect. And they waited for the "other". No matter how pleasant the place was, with the teapot on a nice table surrounded by comfortable chairs of fine woven straw, with a scenery surpassed in beauty only by the Incomparable Gardens, the two men and one woman who were sitting on three of the four chairs did not look like they were glad to be here in the least. It was no word or act that created all this tension between them, only their very presence together was inherently wrong in its very essence. They should not be here, they should never have. When more then two Morrow Days had to gather, it certainly NEVER was for any kind of pleasant business.

They had taken the liberty of having their servants remove two chairs, as of course Monday and Sunday would not come. The latter because he was, to put it in their own words, "just too good for the rest of them" and the former for reasons that were somewhat similar to these but revolved more around "you're not worth the effort".

Grim Tuesday glanced at Lady Friday and Sir Thursday, a glance filled with a kind of subtle enough wariness so they would not notice it or even consider the glance impolite, maybe suspicious at best. But of course he was also wary he was equally being inspected by his two peers, though only Friday cared to hide it too like a hypocrite, Thursday staring both of them with his hooded eyes, uncaring. While the Second and Fifth Morrow Days had their differences, they looked like the best friends of the House compared to whatever relationship they might share with Sir Thursday. Both of them knew he was little more then Saturday's armed arm. Tuesday and Friday knew they had little influence over him and that he could draft considerable workforce out of their hands through his Drafting Privileges. A power he held for himself, but more importantly, for Saturday. For that, they were very careful when dealing with him. That and his… "Behavioural quirks".

But it's not like they truly were friends, so to speak. The Grim knew full well about Lady Friday's addiction to experiencing, a practice he found distasteful and decadent, not to mention non-respectful for mortals in general, though he could care for more. He never really enjoyed bartering with her. She had lots of whims and because she paid for it, he could deny her nothing. Her Mountain Retreat had been a misery to build and he had not enjoyed Making the Gilded Youths. The Piper Children who had been converted into these guards of the Middle House had reminded him of his Nephew and he was sure Thomas would not have approved the Making of these armoured soldiers.

Friday did not really like Tuesday either. Like very Morrow Day she thought he overcharged every single thing he made and she had absolutely no choice but to accept his pricing no matter how ridiculous it got. While she did not really care about them, the loss of workforce to his profit was certainly no benefit for her but at some point it became evident to every Day that paying both in gold and in Denizen was the closest thing of a fair deal there was to be had with him. To her, Grim Tuesday was nothing more then a reckless fool, a greedy one at that. Now that she thought of it, she did not really have friends among the Morrow Days. Her disliking of Tuesday and Thursday was already established, but outside of that, she paid little respect to Monday like all the others, she had little business to do with Wednesday, her relationship with Saturday was cordial at best and of course no one ever addressed Lord Sunday but Saturday herself.

In that regard, Grim Tuesday was in a similar position except he made absolutely no effort to be amiable and so deserved little less then being disliked in return.

All in all it was questionable whether or not the Morrow Days were friends with each other at all. It was known that Wednesday was in good term with Saturday, and it was suspected that the latter had a little something with Sunday. If only they knew the truth… It gets harder to be more wrong then that.

Finally, it was Grim Tuesday who broke the icy silence that reigned over this small tea place set up in the Eternal Fields. It seemed every time they went here, it was related to foul deeds. The first time they broke the Will here, now… he had no idea what was to come but he had a slight feeling it would be bad for someone somewhere…

-"I trust, Friday, that the Weather Control parts you ordered were sufficient to repair your Atmospheric Matrix?"

-"Why do you ask, dear, of course they were. Your work was always of superior craftsmanship. I assume that as requested, you personally supervised the manufacture?"

Such hypocrisy, she clearly knew he did not enjoy taking care of petty matters like that, but she also knew he had little choice but to comply having been paid his full due. And of course they had thought of a very different dialogue then what was spoken. Had they let go of their politeness, they might as well have said:

-"You know I really hate you."

-"Yes me too".

And they both knew it.

-"And, my good Sir Thursday, I trust the last delivery of Not-Horses was delivered in good time?"

-"There's still five dozen Regular Calibre Cannons that have yet to be Made AND delivered." answered very sharply the Overlord of the Great Maze. He stared intently the two other Morrow Days. He shot a severe glance at Friday and her golden robe, mirror-covered hat and stiletto heels set with rubies, then he stared fixedly at Grim Tuesday and his leather jerkin, trousers and top hat. The latter frowned and the two scars where his eyebrows once were met in an annoyed look.

-"Of course a small extra could make me consider haste in the proceed-"

-"Save your breath and spare me your deceit-infested sweet words, Tuesday. You only want me to sell you some of my Regular Soldiers for their hardiness. Well I'll let you know that no one from the Maze will ever work your pitiful Pit, whether they are Draftees or Soldiers or Officers. And don't get started about the conditions in the army. We know full well any of your workers would rather be drafted for all eternity then work for you!"

Friday looked at both Tuesday and Thursday with an amused smile subtly hidden by her hat. She wondered if the two Morrow Days would come to blows. The Grim's fists were clenched and Sir Thursday was volatile as he always was. They were all in the Secondary Realms and so their Keys held their full power, if they had to fight, it would surely be an interesting spectacle. She also knew both of them were particularly tough Denizens, even without their Keys. The encounter could only be brutal… but it never happened, for the one they had been waiting for had finally arrived.

Proud and strong in her cloak of star shine and moon shade, beautiful and gracious in her robe of spun gold sprinkled with sapphires, wise and clever with her circlet of gold with sorcerous runes spelled in diamonds. Superior Saturday quickly glanced at Tuesday and Thursday who had themselves caught sight of her long electric blue hair.

-"Now, gentlemen, I don't suppose causing the destruction of this Realm will be of any use to either of you. Remember we're Saturday, today, I would not like to take responsibility for any foolery of yours."

Both the Grim and Sir Thursday backed down, taking their seats again. Friday was clearly amused but did not dare show it in front of the Superior Sorcerer. They were clearly kept in check by Saturday, not in the least because she "cordially" allowed them to meet in the Secondary Realms outside of their span of power in there.

-"Grim Tuesday. Sir Thursday. Lady Friday." said Saturday as she nodded to each of them as a formal greeting. "Mister Monday is not here?"

-"To put it in his own words, he had more important matters to attend to." said scornfully the Grim. Both Friday and Thursday glanced at him shortly. They clearly thought he talked too much, but both of them judged wisely that remarking it might as well just make him talk some more. Saturday did not seem to mind, though she did add with clear distaste:

-"A character trait shared not only by him I assure you. I had issued invitations to "all" of us."

-"Wednesday is not here?" asked politely Lady Friday.

-"It is quite a fortunate coincidence that you ask because what I have to tell you is quite exactly about her." replied Saturday.

Thursday, who had been very static at best, moved his head the quarter of an inch as he hear Wednesday's name. Tuesday's and Friday's reactions were a bit more elaborate, but it was clear that they were all very surprised that Wednesday was at the very heart of this unusual meeting. Every Day was in fairly good term with her or at least, not bad terms; even Saturday was actually her friend.

-"I regret to announce you Wednesday has betrayed us. She plans on releasing her Part of the Will and relinquish her Key to a Rightful Heir. You are aware this concerns us all then. We cannot abide to have our Keys and Domains taken from us, I am sure you will agree."

-"Why would she do this?" asked Grim Tuesday. He couldn't imagine any reason why a Morrow Day would surrender such power and office.

-"Let us not delve in the reasons of her foolish plan, Tuesday dear." replied Friday. "What we need to do is carefully chose what to do about her. Perhaps we can reason her."

-"There is no reasoning her, Friday. She told me about her plan and no matter what I told her, she would not abandon her disillusions."

-"The problem is we cannot do anything to her because of the Agreement." reminded Thursday. Since Saturday's arrival, he had been silent thus far.

-"This is not a problem at all." snapped Saturday. "The implications of such an act from her affect us all and so the Agreement is already broken. What I need is your support into… demoting her. Your participation would of course facilitate the whole processes, but I need your consent to act."

-"What do you have in mind?" asked Friday who was intrigued and worried.

-"Nothing less but to assume myself the protection of her part of the Will and prevent her from using her Key. I have the Power and the Art for it, but of course your own Power added to mine would considerably reduce personal threats and hazards from the traitor's own puissance, and together we could find a proper way of hiding the Third Part of the Will."

-"Does Lord Sunday agree to that?" asked Thursday. Before she answered, Saturday seemed to hesitate. But she finally said:

-"Are you doubting the honesty of my deputyship of Sunday, Sir Thursday?"

-"No ma'am."

-"Then you have your answer I believe. The three of you need only appose your seals next to mine on this paper and we will act on next Wednesday."

Saturday drew a long roll of parchment with legal text and decreeds all over it. The ink was pale silver and the scroll looked fairly ordinary except for Saturday's golden and exceedingly shiny seal at the bottom. Thursday immediately pressed his thumb next to Saturday's own seal. There was a flash of harsh yellow light and his was there as well. Both Friday and Tuesday seemed to hesitate, though. Of course they did not want to lose their Keys and Domains because one of them betrayed them, but they had the correct feeling that whatever Saturday had in store for Wednesday would not really be pleasant at all. The Morrow Days in general probably did not like each other very well, but not to the point of wanting to hurt another one. Too badly, that is. And Wednesday was the closest thing both Tuesday and Friday of them had to a friend among all the other Trustees.

-"She betrayed you first." Saturday's voice was full of compassion, but was also quite sad at the same time, a curious contrast with the earlier determination that animated her. "Keep in mind she is one of my closest friend. It is not easy for me to do so, but she asked for it."

Grim Tuesday frowned then pressed his thumb on the paper. Friday's face was hidden beneath the shadow of her hat and her own overly bright radiance coming from her clothes, but none of the Morrow Days were affected by that and they saw a slight hesitation on her beautiful face. Then she finally pressed her own thumb on the paper and a fourth seal appeared. Four out of seven, a majority and Lord Sunday supposedly already had agreed to this motion. None of them spoke, but the meeting was clearly over.

Thursday drew his Key, a massive two handed sword, and quickly drew in the air a series of glowing steps. He then simply disappeared as he climbed on the first steps of the Improbable Stairs right after a snappy salute to Superior Saturday.

Grim Tuesday backed away to a small contingent of Overseers and a Grotesque and they all disappeared as they stepped on their own Transfer Plates.

Friday was already gone, transported by the power of her Fifth Key.

An elevator came down for Saturday. Before she climbed in, she took a last glance back at the Eternal Fields. She knew exactly what would happen to Lady Wednesday when she would strip her of her power over the Third Key. She was aware of the long, very long Hell she would endure before her final demise. Saturday was, after all, an exceedingly knowledgeable Sorcerer.

"Why did you betray me, Wednesday? I liked you. I would have saved you and anyone you'd have liked in the end, something I do not even reserve for the other Days. Alas you turned your back on me, and now you will be destroyed. That's the last time I will think of you, my friend."

And it was. The door of the elevator clanged shut behind her and the Eternal Fields were silent once more.

Author's comment: I wanted to illustrate my idea of how the Morrow Days behave among themselves. There is little to be revealed yet about it in the series, the main focus being somewhere else completely. There's still that mystery visit of Lady Friday to Thursday's Citadel but I'm sure it's rather a blurry plot device then anything else, though who knows. Maybe she was drafted once that's all, and she had some privileges like being far away from the serious battles.

It's also a little something so you don't just die till I get my copy of Superior Saturday in August and ponder on how finishing Wednesday's Tale, or at least advancing it a little bit, hehe. Read, yes, but if you could just review to tell me you've read, I'd like it. Have fun!


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